whaling

[ hwey-ling, wey- ]

noun

1. the work or industry of capturing and rendering whales; whale fishing.
2. Digital Technology. a phishing attempt by someone posing as a company’s attorney, CEO, vendor, or other authorized entity in order to scam a payroll department, corporate executive, etc., out of money or confidential information:

   The source of the whaling gave all appearances of legitimacy and trustworthiness.

whaling

/ ˈweɪlɪŋ /

noun

1. the work or industry of hunting and processing whales for food, oil, etc

adverb

1. informal.
   (intensifier)

   a whaling good time

Other Words From

• anti·whaling adjective

Word History and Origins

Origin of whaling¹

whale ¹ + -ing ¹; whaling def 1 was first recorded in 1680–90; whaling def 2 in 2010–15 (in the sense “hunting for a big fish/phish”)

Example Sentences

Hunted nearly to extinction during 20th century whaling, the Antarctic blue whale, the world's largest animal, went from a population size of roughly 200,000 to little more than 300.

From Science Daily

However, it had continued whaling for what it said were research purposes.

From BBC

An 1889 whaling travelogue recounts the sounds made by right whales and humpbacks note by note.

From Salon

Now 30, she also handles sales and emcee duties, summarizing the island’s history of migration, colonization, whaling, plantations and resilience in diplomatically measured tones.

From Los Angeles Times

Japan left the International Whaling Commission in 2019 and now only conducts commercial whaling in its own waters, and on what it calls a sustainable scale.

From BBC

Related Words

• big
• colossal
• enormous
• gargantuan
• gigantic
• huge
• hulking
• humongous
• immense
• jumbo
• mammoth
• monstrous
• vast