Definition of PHISHING

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Phishing is one of the many new computer-related terms that have found their way into the general lexicon over the past decade or so. Its "ph" spelling is influenced by an earlier word for an illicit act: "phreaking." Phreaking involves fraudulently using an electronic device to avoid paying for telephone calls, and its name is suspected of being a shortening of "phone freak." A common phishing scam involves sending e-mails that appear to come from banks requesting recipients to verify their accounts by typing personal details, such as credit card information, into a Web site that has been disguised to look like the real thing. Such scams can be thought of as "fishing" for naive recipients.

Examples of phishing in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

The other danger to signing on to everything with Facebook is the threat of phishing. — Farhad Manjoo, The Seattle Times, "Why you shouldn’t use Facebook to log in to other sites and apps," 2 Oct. 2018 The phishing campaign reported by Certfa was effective for other reasons besides its bypass of 2fa. — Dan Goodin, Ars Technica, "Iranian phishers bypass 2fa protections offered by Yahoo Mail and Gmail," 13 Dec. 2018 The sites appeared to be the early stages of an effort to launch a phishing campaign against the U.S. Senate and conservative-leaning think tanks, Microsoft said. — Dustin Volz, WSJ, "DNC Says Reported Hack Attempt Was a False Alarm," 23 Aug. 2018 Most infamously, hackers accessed multiple celebrities’ iCloud accounts through a phishing campaign that led to the publishing of female victims’ nude photos. — Ashley Carman, The Verge, "Australian teen stole 90 gigabytes of private data from Apple servers," 16 Aug. 2018 The phishing targeted individuals who are involved in the sanctions as well as politicians, civil and human rights activists, and journalists around the world. — Dan Goodin, Ars Technica, "Iranian phishers bypass 2fa protections offered by Yahoo Mail and Gmail," 13 Dec. 2018 As Marriott noted on its FAQ site, people may receive phishing emails related to the hack, so be sure to check who the email is from. — Meredith Carey, Condé Nast Traveler, "Marriott Data Breach: What to Do If You've Been Affected," 30 Nov. 2018 Google pulled out of mainland China in 2010 after discovering a phishing attack targeting human rights activists. — Adi Robertson, The Verge, "Google’s prototype Chinese search engine reportedly links searches to phone numbers," 14 Sep. 2018 Photo: Emily Prapuolenis/The Wall Street Journal Security keys also help protect users from being tricked out of their credentials through a process known as phishing. — David Pierce, WSJ, "The Key to Being Safer Online Is Actually a Key," 21 Oct. 2018

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'phishing.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.