fraud
Americannoun
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frauds
plural
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deceit, trickery, sharp practice, or breach of confidence, perpetrated for profit or to gain some unfair or dishonest advantage.
-
a particular instance of such deceit or trickery.
mail fraud; election frauds.
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any deception, trickery, or humbug.
That diet book is a fraud and a waste of time.
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a person who makes deceitful pretenses; sham; poseur.
noun
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deliberate deception, trickery, or cheating intended to gain an advantage
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an act or instance of such deception
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something false or spurious
his explanation was a fraud
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informal a person who acts in a false or deceitful way
Synonym Usage
See duplicity.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of fraud
First recorded in 1300–50; Middle English fraude, from Old French, from Medieval Latin fraud-, stem of fraus “deceit, injury”
Explanation
A fraud is a something that deceives or tricks another person, usually to get their money. Frauds are dishonest. A fraud is something that sounds too good to be true — because it isn't. If you're promised millions of dollars by anyone on the Internet, that's got to be a fraud. Anyone trying to sell you a bridge is committing fraud. Identity theft is a type of fraud. Democrats and Republicans frequently accuse the other party of fraud when it comes to counting votes. You can also tell a person who is fake or an impostor is a fraud.
Vocabulary lists containing fraud
A Web of Lies
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The Best Starting Words for Wordle
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Smoke and Mirrors: The Lingo of Illusion and Deception
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
The hit movie of the fall is…a three-hour documentary about investor fraud?
From Slate ● Nov. 2, 2026
Minnesota’s blind eye toward the Quality Learing Center fraud was shameless.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 1, 2026
This week the president offered a $1 million reward to any American who reports proven instances of fraud.
From Barron's ● Nov. 1, 2026
They used AI tools to crunch numbers, identify threats to the vote, and mobilise tens of thousands of election monitors to prevent intimidation and electoral fraud by the governing parties.
From BBC ● Nov. 1, 2026
I felt like a little boy in his father's suit, a fraud everyone could see through.
From "We Are the Ants" by Shaun David Hutchinson
Now they crowdsource questions about when the beds will come and how they will work and argue over which medbed whistleblowers are real and which are frauds.
From Slate ● Sep. 22, 2026
The FBI handles international cyber frauds and cross-border financial crimes.
From MarketWatch ● Sep. 14, 2026
At the core of her allegations is a distinction that banks make between frauds and scams, which dictates how customer claims are handled.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 5, 2026
Her fund, Safkhet Capital, had no hedges or long positions—just a handful of bets against companies she believed were predatory businesses or frauds.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 18, 2026
The professionals made no secret of their disdain for the amateurs, whom they regarded as annoyances, cranks, or frauds.
From "1491" by Charles C. Mann
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Get a wordDefinitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
