Word of the day: Phishing

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Hello, and welcome to our Word of the Day, where we explore the origins, meanings, and uses of interesting words. Today’s word is phishing, spelled P-H-I-S-H-I-N-G.

What is Phishing?

Phishing is a type of cybercrime that involves sending fraudulent emails or messages to trick people into revealing their personal or financial information.

The word ‘phishing’ is derived from ‘fishing’—because the criminals use bait to lure their victims.

For example, they may pretend to be from a reputable company or organization and ask you to update your account details, verify your identity, or claim a prize.

If you click on the link or attachment they provide, you may end up on a fake website that steals your data or infects your device with malware.

Our word of the day (phishing) appears in more than 18 articles on our website (at the time of writing this article).

Check out some of our articles with the word ‘phishing’ in the title or content:

How ‘Phishing’ is pronounced?

According to Dictionary, ‘phishing’ (uncountable noun) is:

The activity of tricking people by getting them to give their identity, bank account numbers, etc. over the Internet or by e-mail, and then using these to steal money from them.
–Oxford learner’s dictionaries

Phishing—(/ˈfɪʃɪŋ/)—is pronounced the same as fishing, with a short I sound as in “sit”. Learn how to pronounce the word ‘phishing’ HERE.

Here are some sentences that use the word phishing:

I received a phishing email that claimed to be from my bank, but I noticed some spelling errors and a suspicious sender address.
The police warned the public about a new phishing scam that targets online shoppers during the holiday season.
To protect yourself from phishing attacks, you should always check the source and validity of any messages you receive, and never share your passwords or personal information with anyone.

Practice exercise using phishing–word of the day

Now, let’s practice using the word phishing in some exercises. Fill in the blanks with the correct form of phishing or fish:

He loves to go _ on weekends and catch some trout.
She fell victim to a _ scheme and lost thousands of dollars.
They use sophisticated _ techniques to impersonate legitimate websites and trick users.
He was caught _ for compliments by pretending to be insecure.
She reported the _ attempt to her email provider and deleted the message.

The answers are:

fishing, phishing, phishing, fishing, phishing.

I hope you enjoyed learning about the word phishing today. Remember to be careful and vigilant when you receive any messages that ask for your personal or financial information.

Don’t let the phishers catch you! See you next time on the Word of the Day.