Director Roland Emmerich at the San Sebastian International Film Festival in SpainViral marketing is all the rage these days as the ad men look for increasingly exciting and bizarre ways to promote their product.

But Sony Pictures may have taken things a little too far with their promotion of disaster movie 2012... and they've upset Nasa in the process.The problems stem from a website, set up by Sony, which involves an organisation called the Institute for Human Continuity.

Predicting a cataclysmic event for our home planet in just three years, the site suggest that "after two decades of rigorous research from the world's top astronomers, mathematicians, geologists, physicists, engineers, futurists, we know that in 2012 a series of cataclysmic forces will wreak havoc on our planet."

It may offer details of post 2012 elections, survival kits and a lottery in which the prize is to be saved, but it is in fact just a vehicle promoting the latest Roland Emmerich (of Independence Day and The Day After Tomorrow fame) film.

Starring John Cusack, the film includes typically spectacular scenes of a tsunami hitting the White House and Los Angeles crumbling to the sea.

But the general public have apparently become convinced that there we really could be heading for a sorry end.

Dr David Morrison, a senior scientist at Nasa's Astrobiology Institute, has reportedly already received more than 1,000 inquiries from fearful internet users.

He insists the website is "ethically wrong".

Vikki Luya, publicity director at Sony, told the Telegraph: "It is very clear that this site is connected to a fictional movie. This can readily be seen in the logos on the site."

We have to admit, we're on her side on this one.