phishing

Meanings

Noun

• The malicious act of keeping a false website or sending a false e-mail with the intent of masquerading as a trustworthy entity in order to acquire sensitive information, such as usernames, passwords, and credit card details.
• The act of circumventing security with an alias.

Verb

• Present participle of phish

Related

Similar words

• spoofing

Origin

• Respelling of fishing. In Usenet newsgroups, cracker and pirate groups used variant spellings of phish and warez (i.e. wares) to evade scans and filters by mainstream servers policing the ARPAnet/Internet.