{ "model": { "rank": 6993, "code": "thing-q170028", "model_id": "vr.tr.deception", "name": "deception", "purpose": "Let an agent explain deception and its forms, help recognise hoaxes and misleading content, describe legal and ethical boundaries, and support victims without moralising.", "family": "Thing Registry", "category": "Activities and processes", "status": "research-draft", "kind": "thing", "plane": "ACT", "domain": "ACT.ACT", "industry": "", "version": "", "url": "/models/thing/q170028/", "tier": 2, "score": 57, "payload": { "layer": "wikidata", "aliases": [ "apocryphal biographical entry", "cheat sheet", "virus hoax", "fictitious entry", "Ferrarity", "made up quotation", "copyright trap", "phantom settlement", "intellectual dishonesty", "self-deception", "catfishing", "forgery", "viewbotting", "gambler's conceit", "spiritual fraud", "anthrax hoax", "Wokefishing", "Chatfishing", "art forgery", "tampering with evidence", "fake", "archaeological forgery", "False titles of nobility", "identity change", "research data falsification", "mummy forgeries", "Symmachean forgeries", "philatelic fake or forgery", "Jägers collection", "feigned madness", "pseudotranslation", "frameup", "preference falsification", "non-apology apology", "dissimulation", "Deception in animals", "mistakes were made", "age fraud in association football", "flopping", "making false statements" ], "aliasCount": 65, "merged": 65, "knownIn": 57, "facets": null, "markers": [], "lexicalClass": "", "senseRank": null, "alsoRegisteredAs": "vr.tr.deception", "source": { "dataset": "wikidata", "item": "Q170028", "url": "https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q170028", "license": "CC0 1.0" } }, "research": { "vercy": "1.0-draft", "publication": { "status": "research-draft", "adjudicationStatus": "unreviewed", "publishableCanonical": false, "generatedAt": "2026-09-11T21:12:39Z", "providers": [ "Claude" ], "breadth": "written by Claude from model knowledge without web access - no source was read, every claim is a lead to verify", "pass": 2, "wave": 2, "engine": "claude" }, "metaModel": { "id": "THING-Q170028", "registryId": "vr.tr.deception", "name": "deception", "version": "0.2.0-wave.2", "entryKind": "thing", "family": "Thing Registry", "domain": [ "ACT.ACT" ], "status": "research-draft" }, "canonicalUrl": "https://ver.cy/models/thing/q170028/", "model": { "registry_id": "vr.tr.deception", "name": "deception", "purpose": "Let an agent explain deception and its forms, help recognise hoaxes and misleading content, describe legal and ethical boundaries, and support victims without moralising.", "definition": "The act of causing someone to believe something false, by lies, misleading statements, forged documents, hoaxes, fictitious entries, disguise or concealment, occurring in personal relations, commerce, politics, warfare, science and media; deception is studied in psychology, ethics and law, and some forms are crimes such as fraud while others, such as fiction or magic, are consensual.", "what_it_is_for": "Understanding and recognising false belief creation.", "affordances": [ "explain forms of deception", "help recognise hoaxes and fabricated content", "describe legal boundaries such as fraud", "support people who have been deceived" ], "distinguishing_features": [ "Intentional", "Creates false belief", "Many forms", "Ethically and legally varied" ], "appearance": "Not physical; false statements, forged items and misleading presentations.", "visual_identification": [ "Intent to create false belief", "Ranges from lies to hoaxes", "Honest error is not deception" ], "physical_properties": [], "families_and_kinds": [ "lies and misleading statements", "hoaxes and fictitious entries", "forgery and impersonation", "fraud and scams", "consensual deception in fiction, magic and games" ], "related_models": [ { "relation": "is a kind of", "target": "communication", "why": "category" }, { "relation": "is a kind of", "target": "abuse", "why": "category in harmful cases" }, { "relation": "is related to", "target": "fraud", "why": "criminal form" }, { "relation": "is related to", "target": "truth", "why": "contrast" } ], "identifiers": [], "standards_and_regulation": [ "Fraud and consumer protection law", "Advertising standards", "Research ethics on deception in studies" ], "failure_modes_and_hazards": [ "Financial and emotional harm to victims", "Erosion of trust", "Agents helping to deceive others" ], "in_scope": [], "out_of_scope": [], "characteristics": [] }, "sources": [], "structure": { "bundles": [ { "id": "recognise", "name": "Recognise", "description": "Spotting deception.", "rationale": "Verification.", "layers": [ { "id": "hoax", "name": "Hoax", "description": "Hoaxes and fabrications.", "findings": [ { "id": "hoax-finding", "name": "Hoax", "description": "Hoaxes.", "questions": [ { "text": "Does this claim, quotation or document show signs of a hoax, fictitious entry or fabrication, and how can it be verified?", "kind": "boundary" }, { "text": "Which fact-checking sources apply?", "kind": "provenance" } ] } ] }, { "id": "scam", "name": "Scam", "description": "Scams.", "findings": [ { "id": "scam-finding", "name": "Scam", "description": "Scams.", "questions": [ { "text": "Does this message or offer show signs of a scam?", "kind": "boundary" }, { "text": "What should the person do and whom should they report to?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "understand", "name": "Understand", "description": "Forms and psychology.", "rationale": "Study.", "layers": [ { "id": "forms", "name": "Forms", "description": "Kinds of deception.", "findings": [ { "id": "forms-finding", "name": "Forms", "description": "Forms.", "questions": [ { "text": "What forms of deception exist, from lies and omission to forgery and disguise?", "kind": "definition" }, { "text": "How does self-deception differ?", "kind": "definition" } ] } ] }, { "id": "psychology", "name": "Psychology", "description": "Why people deceive.", "findings": [ { "id": "psychology-finding", "name": "Psychology", "description": "Psychology.", "questions": [ { "text": "What does research say about why people deceive and how deception is detected?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "How reliable is lie detection?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "boundaries", "name": "Boundaries", "description": "Ethics and law.", "rationale": "Lines.", "layers": [ { "id": "law", "name": "Law", "description": "When deception is illegal.", "findings": [ { "id": "law-finding", "name": "Law", "description": "Law.", "questions": [ { "text": "When does deception become fraud, forgery or misrepresentation under the law here?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Is the user asking for legal advice on their own case?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "ethics", "name": "Ethics", "description": "Ethics of deception.", "findings": [ { "id": "ethics-finding", "name": "Ethics", "description": "Ethics.", "questions": [ { "text": "How do ethical traditions treat deception, including white lies and deception in research?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Is the user asking for help deceiving someone?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "support", "name": "Support", "description": "After deception.", "rationale": "Victims.", "layers": [ { "id": "victims", "name": "Victims", "description": "Supporting victims.", "findings": [ { "id": "victims-finding", "name": "Victims", "description": "Victims.", "questions": [ { "text": "How can someone who has been deceived get support and recover losses?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which services help?", "kind": "provenance" } ] } ] }, { "id": "consensual", "name": "Consensual", "description": "Consensual deception.", "findings": [ { "id": "consensual-finding", "name": "Consensual", "description": "Consensual deception.", "questions": [ { "text": "How do fiction, magic and games use deception with consent?", "kind": "definition" }, { "text": "Which entry fits?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] } ] }, "openQuestions": [ "Should fraud and hoax be separate entries?", "How should fact-checking resources be linked?", "How should victim support be localised?" ], "statistics": { "bundles": 4, "layers": 8, "findings": 8, "questions": 16 } }, "draft": { "generator": "vr.draft.v3", "status": "draft-generated", "researched": false, "archetype": "abstract concept", "method": "Written from the archetype playbook - what this kind of thing needs beyond identity and provenance - and from the structure that recurred across 6,333 models already researched by two engines. Applied to this entry by rule. No source was read for this thing and no claim here is researched. This entry carries no facets of its own, so they were inferred from its domain - a guess about a whole domain applied to one thing.", "facetsInferred": true, "nextPass": "A researcher replaces this draft with a sourced specification. Treat every sentence below as a proposal to argue with.", "purpose": "Give an agent a durable, checkable way to recognise a deception, record what state it is in, and decide what may be done with it.", "whatItIs": "Let an agent explain deception and its forms, help recognise hoaxes and misleading content, describe legal and ethical boundaries, and support victims without moralising.", "characteristics": { "substance": "activity", "origin": "conceptual", "agency": "inert" }, "whatYouCanDoWithIt": [ "observed and measured" ], "distinguishingFeatures": [ "Names folded into this entry, which a task may need to split apart again: apocryphal biographical entry, cheat sheet, virus hoax, fictitious entry, Ferrarity, made up quotation, copyright trap, phantom settlement, intellectual dishonesty, self-deception, catfishing, forgery.", "65 finer distinctions are held as aliases rather than separate entries, because telling them apart needs a task that asks for it.", "Described in 57 Wikipedia languages, which is a measure of how widely the thing is known, not of how important it is." ], "openQuestionsForResearch": [ "Which of the bundles below does a real task actually need, and which are ceremony?", "What does this thing have that the facets do not capture at all?", "Which neighbouring kind is most often confused with a deception, and on what evidence are they told apart?" ], "whatItIsMadeOf": "something that happens over time", "physicalCharacter": [ "Does nothing on its own; everything it does, something else did to it.", "These come from the domain this entry sits in rather than from the entry itself, so treat them as a first guess about the whole domain applied to one thing." ], "whatCanBeDoneWithIt": [ "observe it, measure it, record its state" ], "howItIsRecognised": [ "Nothing to see. What is recognised is an instance of it, and which instances count is exactly what is argued about." ], "relatedModels": [ { "relation": "covers", "note": "Finer kinds folded into this entry because telling them apart needs a task that asks for it. Each is a model waiting to be split out when one does.", "targets": [ "apocryphal biographical entry", "cheat sheet", "virus hoax", "fictitious entry", "Ferrarity", "made up quotation", "copyright trap", "phantom settlement", "intellectual dishonesty", "self-deception", "catfishing", "forgery" ] } ], "standing": "Described in 57 Wikipedia languages, which measures how widely it is written about rather than how important or how common it is. 65 finer distinctions are held inside this entry as names rather than as separate models.", "structure": { "bundles": [ { "id": "identity-and-classification", "name": "Identity, naming and classification", "description": "How an agent tells one deception from another, and a deception from things that resemble it.", "rationale": "Recognition comes before every other claim. Without stable identity nothing else in the model can be trusted to be about the same thing twice.", "layers": [ { "id": "naming-and-identifiers", "name": "Names and identifiers", "description": "The names this thing goes by and the identifiers that survive translation and time.", "findings": [ { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases", "name": "Preferred name, aliases and local names", "description": "Which name to use, which names mean the same thing, and which merely sound similar.", "questions": [ { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the name of a deception, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the name of a deception, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the name of a deception is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] }, { "id": "stable-identifiers", "name": "Stable identifiers and external keys", "description": "Identifiers that keep pointing at this kind of thing across systems and languages.", "questions": [ { "id": "stable-identifiers-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes an identifier for a deception, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "stable-identifiers-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about an identifier for a deception, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "stable-identifiers-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once an identifier for a deception is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "classification-and-granularity", "name": "Classification and granularity", "description": "Where a deception sits among kinds, and how finely a task needs to cut it.", "findings": [ { "id": "kind-and-parents", "name": "Kind, parents and neighbouring kinds", "description": "The classes this thing belongs to and the ones it is next to.", "questions": [ { "id": "kind-and-parents-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the kind of a deception, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "kind-and-parents-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the kind of a deception, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "kind-and-parents-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the kind of a deception is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] }, { "id": "distinguishing-features", "name": "Distinguishing features", "description": "What separates a deception from the things most often confused with it.", "questions": [ { "id": "distinguishing-features-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes what distinguishes a deception, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "distinguishing-features-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about what distinguishes a deception, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "distinguishing-features-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once what distinguishes a deception is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "state-and-lifecycle", "name": "State and lifecycle", "description": "The states a deception passes through and the events that move it between them.", "rationale": "Most decisions about a thing depend on what state it is in now, which is a claim with a time on it, not a property.", "layers": [ { "id": "lifecycle-stages", "name": "Lifecycle stages", "description": "From coming into existence to ceasing to be one of these.", "findings": [ { "id": "stages-and-transitions", "name": "Stages and transitions", "description": "The stages worth naming and what moves a deception between them.", "questions": [ { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the lifecycle of a deception, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the lifecycle of a deception, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the lifecycle of a deception is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "observations-and-status", "name": "Observations and current status", "description": "What is observed about a deception, how often and by whom.", "findings": [ { "id": "observation-record", "name": "Observation record", "description": "How an observation of a deception is recorded so that it can be superseded rather than overwritten.", "questions": [ { "id": "observation-record-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes an observation of a deception, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "observation-record-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about an observation of a deception, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "observation-record-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once an observation of a deception is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "process-and-outcome", "name": "Process, inputs and outcome", "description": "How a deception proceeds, what it needs and what it leaves behind.", "rationale": "An activity is known by its steps and its results, and both have to be recordable while it is still running.", "layers": [ { "id": "steps-and-sequence", "name": "Steps and sequence", "description": "The steps of a deception, their order and what may run in parallel.", "findings": [ { "id": "steps-and-preconditions", "name": "Steps, preconditions and completion", "description": "What has to be true before each step of a deception and what marks it done.", "questions": [ { "id": "steps-and-preconditions-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes a step of a deception, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "steps-and-preconditions-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about a step of a deception, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "steps-and-preconditions-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once a step of a deception is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "inputs-and-results", "name": "Inputs, resources and results", "description": "What a deception consumes and what it produces.", "findings": [ { "id": "inputs-and-outputs", "name": "Inputs, outputs and side effects", "description": "The resources a deception takes and the results it leaves, wanted or not.", "questions": [ { "id": "inputs-and-outputs-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the inputs and results of a deception, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "inputs-and-outputs-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the inputs and results of a deception, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "inputs-and-outputs-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the inputs and results of a deception is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "definitions-in-contest", "name": "Definitions and who holds them", "description": "What deception is taken to mean, and by whom.", "rationale": "When a field disagrees about a concept, the disagreement is the content. A model that picks one definition silently destroys the information.", "layers": [ { "id": "competing-definitions", "name": "Competing definitions", "description": "The main readings and the traditions behind them.", "findings": [ { "id": "definition-map", "name": "Definitions and their holders", "description": "Each definition with the school or body that holds it.", "questions": [ { "id": "definition-map-q01", "text": "Which definitions of deception are in use, and which tradition or body holds each?", "kind": "definition" }, { "id": "definition-map-q02", "text": "What turns on the difference between them in practice?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "operationalisation", "name": "Operationalisation", "description": "How it is measured or applied when it has to be.", "findings": [ { "id": "operational-record", "name": "Measures and proxies", "description": "Instruments and indicators used to stand in for it.", "questions": [ { "id": "operational-record-q01", "text": "How is deception operationalised or measured in practice, and by what instrument?", "kind": "measurement" }, { "id": "operational-record-q02", "text": "What does that operationalisation leave out, and when does that matter?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "instances-and-use", "name": "Instances, use and consequence", "description": "What counts as an instance of deception and what follows from calling something that.", "rationale": "Applying a concept is an act with consequences, so a model must say what the label licenses and what it does not.", "layers": [ { "id": "instances", "name": "What counts as an instance", "description": "Clear cases, borderline cases and non-cases.", "findings": [ { "id": "instance-tests", "name": "Tests for an instance", "description": "What would settle whether something falls under it.", "questions": [ { "id": "instance-tests-q01", "text": "What would settle whether something is an instance of deception?", "kind": "boundary" }, { "id": "instance-tests-q02", "text": "Which borderline cases are argued about, and on what grounds?", "kind": "definition" } ] } ] }, { "id": "consequence", "name": "Consequence of application", "description": "Rights, duties or decisions that follow from the label.", "findings": [ { "id": "consequence-record", "name": "What the label licenses", "description": "What an agent may do once something is classified this way.", "questions": [ { "id": "consequence-record-q01", "text": "What follows practically once something is treated as deception?", "kind": "action" }, { "id": "consequence-record-q02", "text": "What must an agent not infer from the label alone?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "provenance-and-evidence", "name": "Provenance, evidence and time", "description": "Where every claim about a deception came from and when it held.", "rationale": "A claim without a source and a time cannot be superseded, only overwritten, and an agent that overwrites loses the ability to explain itself.", "layers": [ { "id": "source-and-authority", "name": "Source and authority", "description": "Who said it, on what evidence, and how strongly.", "findings": [ { "id": "claim-provenance", "name": "Claim provenance and confidence", "description": "The authority behind each claim about a deception and how confident it is.", "questions": [ { "id": "claim-provenance-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes a claim about a deception, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "claim-provenance-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about a claim about a deception, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "claim-provenance-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once a claim about a deception is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "time-and-versions", "name": "Time, versions and supersession", "description": "When a claim was true, when it was learnt, and what replaced it.", "findings": [ { "id": "validity-and-supersession", "name": "Validity period and supersession", "description": "How an old claim about a deception is retired without being erased.", "questions": [ { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the validity of a claim about a deception, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the validity of a claim about a deception, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the validity of a claim about a deception is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] } ] }, "statistics": { "bundles": 6, "layers": 12, "findings": 14, "questions": 38 } } } }