Yahoo! set up a special committee to investigate Thompson's resume last week after it emerged that he may have inflated his academic credentials by falsely claiming to hold a computer sciences degree.

The committee reputedly found evidence that appeared to contradict Thompson's initial claims that the misrepresentation was a one-off error. In a further twist, the Wall Street Journal is reporting that Thompson decided to quit Yahoo! after being diagnosed with cancer of the thyroid during the past week.

During his brief tenure, Thompson slashed 2000 jobs and overhauled management, causing a brief rally in the stock as investors responded with approval to the restructuring operation.

Thompson is being replaced as interim CEO by Ross Levinsohn, head of global media at Yahoo!. Levinsohns' CV may be as ill-starrred as Thompsons, being chiefly remembered as the man in charge of News Corp's disastrous top-of-the-market takeover of MySpace.