2013 January 17, Mary Pilon, “In Te’o Story, Deception Ripped From the Screen”, in The New York Times[1], →ISSN:
A so-called catfish is the engineer of the false online identity, a reference to the bottom-feeding, whiskered water dwellers. Getting catfished is when someone falls for a person online who is not necessarily real. It can involve pictures, phone calls, social media profiles, text messages, e-mails and even phony friends or family members.
2013 January 18, Aisha Harris, “Who Coined the Term “Catfish”?”, in Slate[2]:
Catfish the movie was followed by an MTV reality show of the same name, and, in the wake of this week’s revelations about Notre Dame footballer Manti Te’o, the term “catfish” has gone mainstream. Today, it has a narrower definition than it did when Vince Pierce used it: Typically, it refers to a person who creates a fake online profile in order to fraudulently seduce someone. It has also become a verb to refer to the act of doing so.
2013 January 19, Erinn Connor, “Manti Te'o fake girlfriend hoax draws attention to "catfishing"”, in The Record[3]:
Followers of the saga of Notre Dame star linebacker Manti Te'o and his tragically deceased girlfriend – who never existed, as was recently revealed – have heard the fake relationship described with a curious term: "catfishing."
2013 April 12, Jim Edwards, “Hearst Exec May Have Been Victim Of 'Catfish' Sexting Scam”, in Business Insider[4]:
Scott Sassa, the former president of entertainment and syndication at Hearst who left his job after sexual text messages he wrote were sent to the company's legal department, may have been the victim of a "catfish" scam, three sources tell Business Insider.
2013 May 5, Melissa Jean McNelis, “Relational Deception: ‘Til Facebook Due Us Part”, in Auburn University:
“Catfish” is a relatively new term that describes social network users who create fake profiles, attract innocent victims, reel them in to a relationship, and break their romantic partner’s heart when they are exposed. This deceptive relationship occurs so often that MTV created a show called Catfish with a host who had previously been catfished.
2013 November 4, 1:40 from the start, in And the Girlfriend Experience (2 Broke Girls), season 3, episode 7, spoken by Caroline (Beth Behrs):
No, catfishing is when you pretend to be someone you're not on the Internet. You know, like everyone on the Internet.
2014 January 16, 12:17 from the start, in Cooperative Polygraphy (Community), season 5, episode 4 (TV), spoken by Troy (Donald Glover), via NBC:
[to Abed] You made a profile for a fake dude and lured her into an online relationship. [to Annie] He's catfishing you.
“The whole story, as far as me being catfished, I know the girl that sent the pictures out,” George, 23, told the Indianapolis Star. “It wasn’t a catfish story, it was a girl. I don’t want to get into the story but I know who’s behind it.”
Casey confessed she spiraled out of control after the bizarre catfishing incident, admitting she found casual sex as a means of dealing with her deep seeded [sic] insecurities and painfully low self esteem.
