Democratic Representative Anthony Weiner has hired an attorney to investigate the hacking of his Twitter account after a lewd photo was sent to one of his followers, his office said on Tuesday.

Look, this is a prank, not a terribly creative one and it's a distraction, Weiner said on NY1 TV.

His office confirmed to Reuters that the New York congressman, who has a high profile as an advocate of liberal causes, has hired an attorney to advise him on whether or not he could press criminal charges as a result of the alleged hack of his Twitter account.

Weiner said his account was hacked when a lewd photo of a man in bulging boxer briefs was tweeted to a 21-year-old female college student in Washington state over the weekend.

The posting was quickly deleted and Weiner made light of the incident on his Twitter page.

More Weiner Jokes for all my guests! he tweeted with the hashtag Hacked!

The student, Gennette Cordova, issued a statement to the New York Daily News that denied she personally knew Weiner but said, I am a fan.

She denounced rumors she was intimately involved with Weiner, who is married to Huma Abedin, a longtime aide to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

All of this is so outlandish that I don't know whether to be pissed off or amused, quite frankly, Cordova said in the statement.

(Reporting by Aman Ali; Editing by Barbara Goldberg and Jerry Norton)

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