shill
/ʃɪl
/North American informal
noun
1An accomplice of a confidence trickster or swindler who poses as a genuine customer to entice or encourage others: I used to be a shill in a Reno gambling club figurative the agency is a shill for the nuclear power industry...
- The carnival shill plays on the behavior of prospective customers in this way.
- Sophisticated news consumers know that Clarke is a fraud and a shill for the campaign.
- So I suppose this makes me a member of the international neocon conspiracy as well as an evil shill for the oil industry.
1.1A person who pretends to give an impartial endorsement of something in which they themselves have an interest: a megamillionaire who makes more money as a shill for corporate products than he does for playing basketball...
- She is really a PR consultant, who candidly calls herself a "paid shill for the Bush administration."
- Not only is he wrong, he's a shill for the GOP, which makes for dull radio.
- At the risk of seeming to be a shill for David Talbot, let me suggest that non-subscribers reconsider.
verb [no object]
Act or work as a shill: your husband in the crowd could shill for you...
- He shilled for the shipping magnate in his bid to lead the Liberals.
- But Tom is as stalwart as the administration for which he shilled so continuously, before taking his book-writing sabbatical.
- Worse, he suggests, they shilled for Wall Street, conflating the interests of the big banks with the financial health of the world.
Origin
Early 20th century: probably from earlier shillaber, of unknown origin.