I remember becoming first familiar with the word "phishing." Well goodness, I remember becoming first familiar with the word "spamming" too. There are so many new words since the internet came into being that I cannot keep up with them all and I wonder sometimes what word they can come up with next!
I mean really. These words below are not even that complicated of a word. You would think all the easy words would have already been created and in our vocabular, but apparently there is an infinite number of combinations for easy words that have never been thought up yet.
Phishing is by email which is fishing for you to give them personal information. If in doubt, do not click on that email link and goodness, do not sign in. The website may be a fake one made up to look like your real bank's website and before you know it, you've given the bad guys the log in information and there goes your money!
Vishing is fraudulent voice messages. Oh, those bad guys do stalk the elderly without internet too! There is a belief that the older folks will fall for anything and they are a target to speak to over the phone to extract information so that they can steal their money.
Smishing is a combination of the words “phishing” and “SMS,” to indicate phishing sent via mobile (cell) phone in the form of a texting. This is a new word to me here in 2021 as I write this page. I have personally been getting a lot of these and blocking the phone numbers. How about you? I get texts inviting me to click on a link to track a package I have not ordered. If in doubt, do not click! Sometimes I get texts with a special offering inviting me to click. If in doubt, do not click! Block the number instead.
Noun & Verb -- You can get a smish from someone who is smishing!
So what will the bad guys do next? I'm sure they will try to find yet another way to try to take from others and this will be the cause of yet another new word.