Catfishing
Etymology
From the 2010 documentary Catfish and the MTV series it spawned, which followed online romances built on false identities. The film ends with an anecdote claiming that live cod shipped with catfish stay lively — a metaphor for people who keep others on their toes — and that image gave the deception its name. The origin anecdote is itself somewhat folkloric, but the term stuck.
noun · /KAT-fish-ing/
Luring someone into a relationship by adopting a fabricated online identity, often using stolen photos and an invented life.
What it names
A deception that the internet uniquely enables — sustained intimacy with a person who does not exist as presented — and gives victims a recognized word for an experience that is otherwise hard to explain.
Example
She’d been dating him online for a year before realizing she’d been catfished with someone else’s photos.
Related idea
A deepfake fabricates realistic media of a real person; catfishing fabricates an entire fake person to fool someone directly.