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Origin and history of spyware

spyware(n.)

"software used to obtain covert information about a computer's activities by transmitting data covertly from its hard drive to another computer," by 2000, from spy + ending from software in the computer sense.

Entries linking to spyware

by 1820, soft-wares, "woolen or cotton fabrics," also, "relatively perishable consumer goods," from soft + ware (n.). The use in reference to computers is a separate coinage, attested by 1960, based on hardware in the computing sense.

[The auction] where each person seemed equally anxious to purchase the hard-wares, the soft-wares and the brittle-wares, held up for sale. [Mrs. Mac Nally, Eccentricity, 1820.]

mid-13c., spien, "to watch stealthily," from Old French espiier "observe, watch closely, spy on, find out," probably from Frankish *spehon or some other Germanic source, from Proto-Germanic *spehon- (source also of Old High German *spehon "to look out for, scout, spy," German spähen "to spy," Middle Dutch spien). These are the Germanic survivals of the productive PIE root *spek- "to observe."

Old English had spyrian "make a track, go, pursue; ask about, investigate," also a noun spyrigend "investigator, inquirer." Italian spiare, Spanish espiar also are Germanic loan-words.

The meaning "catch sight of, discover at a distance or from a place of concealment" is from c. 1300. The intransitive meaning "play the spy, conduct surveillance" is from mid-15c. The children's game I spy was so called by 1946.

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