Truth is, this is nothing new, people have been impersonating Matt Cutts since the GoogleGuy days. I’ve seen many comments here from “Matt Cutts” that were indeed not from Matt Cutts, I’ve seen people claim Matt emailed them when he did not.

With Matt Cutts on leave, it makes it even harder to believe that he is responding to SEO questions on blogs or email.

So when Paul Botham posted in Google Webmaster Help forums that Matt’s blog was hacked and he was emailing back and forth about penalties with Cutts, it had to be a lie.

One, the blog that he is referencing is mattcuttsblog.com which is not owned by Matt Cutts himself.

Two, Matt is on vacation and is staying out of search quality topics while he is gone.

Three, Matt would only email you from an @google.com address, not a gmail address or something else.

Google’s Eric Kuan came in to clarify in the thread:

So don’t fall for fake Matt Cutts impersonators.

Forum discussion at Google Webmaster Help.