Few things can be more joyful than the birth of a newborn baby and many parents across the world make use of baby monitors to keep an eye on the little one when they are in the house.

So imagine the shock and horror that  parents of a two year old girl felt when they walked into their daughter’s bedroom only to hear a foul-mouthed thug bellowing at the toddler and calling her a “slut” from the baby monitor.

The parents of Allyson Gilbert, overhead the monster who had hacked into their baby monitor, shouting things such as “wake up you little slut”.

Thankfully, given the circumstances, Allyson was unable to hear the abuse being meted out by the hacker, because she is hearing impaired.

The hacker was able to control the movements of the camera and referred to the little girl by name after seeing it spelled out on her bedroom wall.

When the hacker saw the parents, Marc and Lauren walk into the room, he hurled abuse at them too calling them names such as “bitch” and “moron”.

The family was based in Houston, Texas and said that the hacker had a European or British accent.

Mr Gilbert said: “It felt like somebody broke into our house”.

Experts are now warning the owners of Foscam cameras – sold in Britain for £70 – to use secure usernames and passwords.

However, details on how to access the cameras are shared on popular forums.

Added to that, research by Qualys has revealed that one in five of the devices are insecure and that British families are equally at risk of hacking.

The case opens up the possibilities that the baby monitors could also be used as a way of spying on families, by both hackers and other third party organisations.