Google apparently got caught with its pants down once news of Michael Jackson’s death began to spread virally across the interwebz.
The increase in Michael Jackson search terms on Thursday was first seen as a malware attack, Google admitted.
Follow our full coverage here: Michael Jackson Dies
Google News was forced to temporarily shut down briefly, showing only the following message:
“We’re sorry, but your query looks similar to automated requests from a computer virus or spyware application. To protect our users, we can’t process your request right now.”
Yahoo, therefore, saw a record number of visitors for the day with 16.4 million uniques. It was also the single-most-visited story in the company’s history.
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