📢 Giving information 🕵️ Giving evidence

informing

7.7

Telling the police that someone broke the law to get a reward or less punishment

noun
/ɪnˈfɔːrmɪŋ/

: delación

His informing of the police led to a reduced sentence for his role in the crime.

Examples

The ongoing informing by a witness helped authorities uncover the entire conspiracy.
And obviously there was a lot of informing going on and and there was a guy that I met.
She feared that her informing would put her in danger from the criminals.

Synonyms

disclosure

vsinforming

176 4.1

Making secret or new information known to others

is specifically about telling law enforcement incriminating facts for a benefit

ratting

vsinforming

Slang

1 9.5

Giving the police information that causes someone to be arrested to get a lighter punishment

is broader, covering any benefit or leniency rather than only personal gain

Antonyms

shielding

2 4.2

Act of protecting people or things from harm

protecting

1.3

Keeping people and things safe from harm

How Cooperative

state's evidence

Specialized

11 8.3

informing

7.7

noncompliance

7 7.7

Surface Forms

informing singular

informings plural

Morphology

informing = inform (semi-transparent) = inform + ing

Formally a nominalization of 'inform', but the specialized sense 'inform (on someone)' = provide incriminating evidence is a narrower collocational/legal usage not obvious from the general verb.

Etymology

Informing also came to mean giving information to the police or other authorities, which is why 'informing' can mean telling on someone. A helpful way to remember this is that it is still 'giving information', but to those in power, so it can feel like betraying someone.