Tuesday has one extra second and that could be dangerous for the internet

Jun29

by Sindy Cator on June 29, 2015 at 1:31 pm

This Tuesday, a single second will be added to clocks around the world to help counter Earth’s rotation slowing down. Called a “leap second,” it has been added approximately every 18 months since 1972 to rectify ‘lost’ time from the slowing rotation, ensuring that the atomic clock is in sync with Earth. Humans can handle the additional second without even being aware of it, but computers aren’t quite accustomed to the path of time suddenly changing. A leap second was last added to the clock in 2012, during a weekend, which wreaked havoc online. It caused Reddit, Foursquare, Yelp, LinkedIn, Gawker and StumbleUpon to be knocked offline entirely, as well…