DePaul student unexpectedly tangled in alleged Ted Cruz sex scandal

CHICAGO (WLS) -- A DePaul student was unexpectedly caught in the middle of a short-lived political scandal. Her picture was used to help spread a rumor about a presidential candidate that wasn't true.

Samantha Rivera said her phone was ringing so much it woke her up Wednesday morning. There were also texts and emails asking her if she had an affair with a presidential candidate. The journalism major at DePaul says nothing she learned in public relations classes prepared her for this.

Rivera's profile picture is at the center of an alleged sex scandal involving Republican Presidential Candidate Ted Cruz.

Rivera said someone used her picture and created a fake Twitter account claiming to be someone named Jennifer Carr, a writer for the Los Angeles Times. Carr isn't real, but whoever created the Twitter account tweeted that she was a mistress of the Texas senator.

"This person was using my profile picture to pose as one of Ted Cruz' mistresses. I was completely dumbfounded, you know, who would do this?" Rivera said.

Rivera, who is a junior at DePaul University, says she has never met Cruz. She says her father did some investigating and traced the tweets to an account that has several aliases.

"He used the Jennifer Carr account to retweet a bunch of his stuff, and from there, they led to his account," Rivera said.

Rivera is a radio host for Univision's La Hora Picante and she says this incident has become a lesson that was learned off campus.

"I was always careful about what I put on social media, but with this, it scares me a lot more in terms of privacy," she said.

The fake Jennifer Carr Twitter account has been reported and removed. The Cruz campaign has accused Donald Trump of planting rumors of affairs, something the Trump camp denies.

Meantime, Rivera records her radio show on Friday and she is planning to devote a segment to hacking in social media.