misidentify

verb

mis·​iden·​ti·​fy ˌmis-ī-ˈden-tə-ˌfī How to pronounce misidentify (audio)
-ə-ˈden-
misidentified; misidentifying

transitive verb

: to identify (someone or something) incorrectly
… a coroner apparently misidentified the bullet he removed from the victim, stating that its caliber differed from that of the bullet entered as evidence against the known shooter.David Fisher
While examining the American Museum's collection, I came across a mongoose specimen that was clearly misidentified.W. Chris Wozencraft

Examples of misidentify in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web But now, Target is pulling the item off shelves after a viral TikTok in which Espy pointed out inaccuracies such as misidentifying names and pictures of iconic Civil Rights leaders. Ramishah Maruf, CNN, 2 Feb. 2024 The article also misidentifies the type of glasses used in lab sessions during the Covid pandemic. New York Times, 28 Jan. 2024 Facial recognition misidentifies criminal suspects? Gideon Lewis-Kraus, The New Yorker, 30 Nov. 2023 Early in the investigation, many details of the shooting remained unclear, with the sheriff’s office mistakenly misidentifying family members and court records excluding names of the victims in some documents and misspelling them in others. Emily Palmer, Peoplemag, 17 Jan. 2024 Female-sounding voice assistants like Siri reinforce the idea that women are compliant and facial recognition tech has been shown to misidentify women, and women of color in particular, at higher rates than other subjects. Andrea Guzman, Fortune, 27 June 2023 The biases that cause AI systems to make false assumptions about certain groups of people or to misidentify people of color in facial recognition is essentially a reflection of the biases prevalent in society. Alexei Oreskovic, Fortune, 8 Jan. 2024 Facial recognition systems were found more likely to misidentify Black and Asian people, for example, and Amazon dumped a recruiting program that favored male over female applicants. Jean Marbella, Baltimore Sun, 3 Jan. 2024 An article on Page 14 this weekend about the fight to preserve praise houses misidentifies the location of a temporary praise house constructed for an art project. New York Times, 26 Nov. 2023

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'misidentify.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

First Known Use

1867, in the meaning defined above

Time Traveler
The first known use of misidentify was in 1867

Dictionary Entries Near misidentify

Cite this Entry

“Misidentify.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/misidentify. Accessed 28 Mar. 2024.

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