Idiom
inside job
Meaning
A crime or other illicit action committed by or with the assistance of someone either having a relationship with a victim or entrusted with access to the victim's affairs and premises.
Meaning adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Examples
“The police think the robbery was an inside job.”
“The coach believes the leaked game plan is an inside job.”
“The security guard realized the theft was an inside job because the alarm system was disabled from the inside.”
“Management suspects the missing inventory is an inside job because the warehouse keys were never forced and only a few staff members have the code.”
“Investigators concluded that the sophisticated data breach was an inside job, orchestrated by a disgruntled employee with full access to the company's private servers.”
Examples
simple
“The police think the robbery was an inside job.”
“The coach believes the leaked game plan is an inside job.”
contextual
“The security guard realized the theft was an inside job because the alarm system was disabled from the inside.”
“Management suspects the missing inventory is an inside job because the warehouse keys were never forced and only a few staff members have the code.”
complex
“Investigators concluded that the sophisticated data breach was an inside job, orchestrated by a disgruntled employee with full access to the company's private servers.”
Origin
The phrase is first attested in 1908, appearing in print as a descriptor for a crime committed by a person already legitimately present on the premises. It emerged as a compound of the preposition inside and the noun job, entering the lexicon to denote a breach of security by one of its supposed guardians.
Key words
Related idioms
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