Is phishing a legitimate form of "hacking" or is it classified as something else?

Question

Is phishing a legitimate form of "hacking" or is it classified as something else?

Answer 1

anyway it is about deceiving people.

Answer 2

It's not hacking. Phising emails (Bill Gates wants to give you a $million or your long lost uncle in darkest Africa has left you £million) are initial attempts to get you hooked (hence Phising = Fishing) that will lead to an exchange of emails that gradually get you to part with money in some way or another. Most of these come from the 'Lagos Lads' in West Africa and all originate in Internet cafes.

Answer 3

It really is social engineering, but that itself is considered part of hacking, it really is essential to hacking as brute force is not an option with current security measures on servers and sites, it is the art of hacking people instead of machines and is much easier then trying brute force, all you need to do is appeal to your target and what they want, like pornography which people want and often has malware.