Nasty surprise or joke embedded and hidden in software code. The original was allegedly (and perhaps apocryphally) an anatomically absurdly endowed male rabbit or “bunny,” embedded in a game and timed to appear at Easter, performing an obscene act of self-indulgence (the editor of the print edition of this book required euphemisms to be used in this entry.) Now used as a generic term for embedded software “bombs“—a big risk when dealing with companies with poor employee relations or where the programmer is about to leave, be laid off or is made redundant. A key problem with an Easter Bunny is that it may not appear until the product is already on sale and puzzled children are asking, to their parents’ consternation, “Who is the rabbit and WHAT IS HE DOING?!!!” Now more commonly referred to as an “Easter Egg” although the latter is usually not malicious.