Google has admitted that it mistook the sudden spike in
searches for Michael Jackson last week for an automated cyber
attack.
As word spread of Michael Jackson's death there was a "meteoric
rise" in related searches.
"Search volume began to increase around 2:00pm (PDT),
skyrocketed by 3:00pm, and stabilised by about 8:00pm," Google
product manager RJ Pittman said in a
blog post.
According to Pittman, last week also saw one of the largest
mobile search spikes ever seen, with five of the top 20 searches
about Jackson
As a result, for about 25 minutes, when some people searched
Google News they saw a "We're sorry" page before finding the
articles they were looking for, said Pittman.
The surge in demand for news and information about Michael
Jackson
hit most US news sites, with many taking more than double the
usual time to respond.
Microblogging site Twitter was forced to disable some
functionality on the network to keep the service working.