social engineering

noun

1

: management of human beings in accordance with their place and function in society : applied social science

2

: social methods (such as phishing) that are used to obtain personal or confidential information which can then be used illicitly

The previously noted trend of switching from social engineering to hacking methods in attacks on organizations strengthened …

—San Fernando Valley (California) Business Journal

social engineer noun

plural social engineers

Examples of social engineering in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

The hackers who stole billions of dollars in cryptocurrency from the Binance exchange spent months working on the theft and used both social engineering and novel malware in the process, the company said Tuesday. — Dan Goodin, ArsTechnica, 4 Nov. 2026

Phishing and social engineering attacks have become harder to detect as AI has matured, and AI scaling within organizations has introduced new risks to corporate environments. — Rick Vanover, Forbes.com, 30 Oct. 2026

These types of harms could include defamation, bias, deceit and social engineering and much more. — Anat Lior, The Conversation, 21 Oct. 2026

What Apple says about suspicious iMessages Apple says this type of deceptive messaging uses social engineering, a tactic in which scammers rely on impersonation and manipulation to persuade people to share personal information. — Kurt Knutsson, FOXNews.com, 13 Oct. 2026

Word History

First Known Use

1899, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Rhymes for social engineering

• bioengineering
• adhering
• appearing
• careering
• cohering
• endearing
• inhering
• prehearing
• rehearing
• veneering
• cheering
• clearing

Kids Definition

social engineering

noun

1

: management of human beings in accordance with their place and function in society : applied social science

2

: social methods (such as phishing) that are used to obtain personal or confidential information which can then be used illicitly