He’s entertained us with his teary histrionics, participation in the legendary boot camp ‘Diva-Hoedown’ and amazing outfits (hair extension shoulder pads, anyone?). But it appears that not everyone is quite as obsessed with X Factor finalist Rylan Clark as he revealed to us in an exclusive chat.

“People are saying some really vile things,” he confessed. “The producers have actually taken my phone away from me tonight.

“I read it all – the good, the bad – and, oh my god, the bad is bad as can be. But I’m lost without me phone, I don’t know any of the TOWIE goss – what’s going on? What’s happened? I need my phone back.”

(Don’t worry guys, we quickly filled him in on the demise of Gemma and Arg and the return of Kirk.)

Judge Gary Barlow has previously said he wanted to see a complete Twitter ban implemented for vulnerable contestants.

He said: “They'd look at 100 comments and 99 would be positive but all they would think about was the one that was negative. It's not good for them.

"If they didn't see Twitter, it would be much better for them. If I have my way, I'll take their phones off them as soon as they go into the contestants' house.

"The X Factor is hard work. They need to put all their energies into their performances, rather than worrying about who has said what about them on Twitter."

Don’t worry about the online meanies Rylan – we only love to see you cry when you’re happy (seriously, it’s like our favourite thing.)