Phishing
An attempt to trick someone into revealing credentials or approving a harmful transaction, often by impersonating a trusted source.
Phishing is a social-engineering attack that tries to trick a person into revealing sensitive information, such as a private key or seed phrase, or into approving a transaction they wouldn't approve if they understood what it actually did. It often impersonates a legitimate service, contact, or support agent.
In crypto specifically, phishing frequently targets seed phrases, wallet approvals, and login credentials, because obtaining any of these can give an attacker direct control over funds — often with no way to reverse the resulting transaction. See Kaavon's "Seed Phrase" and "Private Key" glossary definitions for exactly what's at stake, and "Two-Factor Authentication" for one practical defense against a compromised password alone.
Examples
- A message claiming to be wallet support and asking for a seed phrase is a phishing attempt.
- A link that looks like a familiar exchange but has a slightly altered domain name is a common phishing technique.
Learn more
Crypto Security Basics
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Keylogger
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Fake Wallet App
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DNS Hijacking
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The Trezor and BitBox Phishing Emails: Why They Passed Every Authentication Check
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