The CCTV footage shows Cathy Cruz Marrero using her mobile phone when she trips over a low wall and falls into a fountain at the Berkshire Mall shopping centre in Massachusetts.

A security guard is heard laughing as he replays the video to his colleagues.

He has since been sacked for sharing the footage online, where it has proved hugely popular on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter.

The 49-year old from Pennsylvania - who works at the shopping centre - appeared on Good Morning America with her lawyer and said someone should have helped instead of making her a national laughing stock.

She said: "I didn't get an apology, what I got was 'at least nobody knows it was you'. But I knew it was me."

Her lawyer, James Polyak, said an investigation is under way to see if legal action can be taken to "hold the appropriate persons accountable".

"We are troubled by the fact that anyone at the Berkshire Mall responsible for releasing this video would find humour in an employee injured on the premises," he told Pennsylvania's Reading Eagle.

US Security Associates, the company that provides security at the shopping centre, said in a statement that it "does not condone this type of behaviour" and would "ensure processes are put in place to prevent it from happening in the future".