Clearly attempting to make a joke with their followers, The National Police Air Service shared a photograph of Michael McIntyre on their Twitter feed today.
In the image, the dad-of-two could be seen standing on a street near Charing Cross, central London.
The caption, attempting to draw people into a guessing game, read: "Whilst on tasking in central London this morning we spotted a certain energetic funny man...
“Can you guess who?.."
However the photo, which had been snapped from a helicopter high above, had clearly been snapped without the dad-of-two’s knowledge.
And Twitter was quickly flooded with comments from Michael’s horrified fans.
One wrote simply: "That is a bit of a disturbing post from NPAS."
Another added: “Did you seek the individual’s consent? Or is this an abuse of your considerable surveillance powers?”
“You do a great job but this is dodgy,” snapped another. “Do you have permission to post pics of these people from a spy cam on Twitter?”
Others added that the post was “creepy” and a “gross misuse of police power”.
Michael’s publicist Alison Peters, who was also captured in the image, revealed that she was in shock after seeing the snap online.
"I'm sat here staring at myself on the screen,” she said, according to The Mirror. “It's crazy."
After being slammed by Gerard Batten, UKIP MEP for London, over the implications that the post had raised for civil liberties, NPAS London deleted the offending image.
However a spokesman for the Met Police has defended the team’s actions, saying: "This tweet does not as far as we know constitute a breach of data protection legislation.
"The tweet was deleted because of a negative response on Twitter."
A spokesman for McIntyre has said that there would be no comment from the star.