Twitter was one of the fastest growing web sites in 2008, seeing a tenfold rise in UK traffic in the past 12 months, according to new data from online research firm Hitwise.

The latest figures rank Twitter as the 291st most visited web site in the UK, up from a ranking of 2,953 for the week ending 19 January 2008. UK traffic to the site increased by a whopping 974 per cent over the period.

Robin Goad, director of research at Hitwise, said that Twitter would be even more popular than the figures suggest if statistics for people accessing their accounts via mobile phones and third-party applications were included.

"Many people seem to find Twitter addictive. The average amount of time that people spend on Twitter.com has more than trebled, from under 10 minutes a year ago to half an hour now," he said.

"The fastest growing age group of users is 35- to 44-year olds, who now account for 17.3 per cent of UK visitors to Twitter.com."

Twitter has also become an important part of the web ecosystem, sending traffic in significant numbers to other sites. Nearly 10 per cent of its downstream traffic goes to news and media web sites, while over 17 per cent goes to entertainment sites, according to Hitwise.

The success of the micro-blogging phenomenon has been helped by celebrities setting up accounts. US president Barack Obama made unprecedented use of the tool as a means to reach voters and solicit donations.

However, the site has also been in the news for the wrong reasons. Earlier this month a hacker managed to compromise the accounts of several high-profile Twitter users, including Obama and Britney Spears, and post fictional updates to their feeds.