Word.ws English Dictionary

fork bomb

fork bomb noun: a program that creates a large number of self-replicating tasks or processes in a computer system in order to cause a denial of service.

Noun

fork bomb (plural fork bombs)

  1. A program that creates a large number of self-replicating tasks or processes in a computer system in order to cause a denial of service.
    • In contrast to the wabbit's slow growth, a fork bomb quickly generates multiple copies itself.2002, Philip E. N. Howard, “Hacktivism”, in Steve Jones, editor, Encyclopedia of New Media, SAGE Publications, →ISBN, page 216
    • By using the limits described in this chapter, you can mitigate the risk of a fork bomb by restricting the maximum number of processes that a single user can invoke. While the fork bomb can still cause your system to become highly loaded, […]2020, Wale Soyinka, Linux Administration: A Beginner’s Guide, Eighth Edition, McGraw Hill Professional, →ISBN, page 331

Forms of fork bomb

pluralfork bombs
alternative formforkbomb

Origin of fork bomb

From fork (“splitting-up of an existing process”) + bomb.

Questions about fork bomb

What does fork bomb mean?
Fork bomb means a program that creates a large number of self-replicating tasks or processes in a computer system in order to cause a denial of service.
What part of speech is fork bomb?
Fork bomb is a noun.
What is the plural of fork bomb?
The plural of fork bomb is fork bombs.

Words near fork bomb in the dictionary

  1. forjudges
  2. forjudging
  3. fork
  4. fork beam
  5. fork beams
  6. fork bomb
  7. fork bombs
  8. fork buffet
  9. fork buffets
  10. fork chuck
  11. fork chucks

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: fork bomb (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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