A scandal is a widely publicized allegation or set of allegations that damages (or tries to damage) the reputation of an institution, individual or creed. A scandal may be based on true or false allegations or a mixture of both.

From the Greek σκάνδαλον (skandalon), a trap or stumbling-block, the metaphor is that wrong conduct can impede or "trip" people's trust or faith.

Some scandals are broken by whistleblower

Whistleblower

A whistleblower is a person who tells the public or someone in authority about alleged dishonest or illegal activities occurring in a government department, a public or private organization, or a company...

s who reveal wrongdoing within organizations or groups, such as Deep Throat

Deep Throat

Deep Throat is the pseudonym given to the secret informant who provided information to Bob Woodward of The Washington Post in 1972 about the involvement of United States President Richard Nixon's administration in what came to be known as the Watergate scandal...

 (William Mark Felt

W. Mark Felt

William Mark Felt, Sr. was an agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation , who retired in 1973 as the Bureau's Associate Director...

) during the 1970s Watergate scandal

Watergate scandal

The Watergate scandal was a political scandal during the 1970s in the United States resulting from the break-in of the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate office complex in Washington, D.C., and the Nixon administration's attempted cover-up of its involvement...

. Sometimes an attempt to cover up

Cover-up

A cover-up is an attempt, whether successful or not, to conceal evidence of wrong-doing, error, incompetence or other embarrassing information...

 a possible scandal ignites a greater scandal when the cover-up fails.

Western world

In the United States, United Kingdom and Canada, scandals, particularly political ones, are often referred to by adding the suffix "-gate" to a word connected with the events, recalling the Watergate scandal

Watergate scandal

The Watergate scandal was a political scandal during the 1970s in the United States resulting from the break-in of the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate office complex in Washington, D.C., and the Nixon administration's attempted cover-up of its involvement...

, such as "Nannygate

Nannygate

Nannygate was a 1993 political controversy in the United States wherein the nomination of Zoë Baird, and near-nomination of Kimba Wood, for U.S. Attorney General were withdrawn due to the hiring of illegal aliens as nannies or the failure to pay taxes for them...

".

List of scandals

• Political scandal
  Political scandal
  A political scandal is a kind of political corruption that is exposed and becomes a scandal, in which politicians or government officials are accused of engaging in various illegal, corrupt, or unethical practices...
  
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• Academic scandals
  Academic dishonesty
  Academic dishonesty or academic misconduct is any type of cheating that occurs in relation to a formal academic exercise. It can include* Plagiarism: The adoption or reproduction of original creations of another author without due acknowledgment.* Fabrication: The...
  
  
• Sporting scandals
• Game show scandals
  Quiz show scandals
  The American quiz show scandals of the 1950s were a series of revelations that contestants of several popular television quiz shows were secretly given assistance by the show's producers to arrange the outcome of a supposedly fair competition....
  
  
• Corporate scandals
• Journalistic scandals
• Olympic Games scandals
• Roman Catholic sex abuse cases
  Roman Catholic sex abuse cases
  The Catholic sex abuse cases are a series of convictions, trials and ongoing investigations into allegations of sex crimes committed by Catholic priests and members of religious orders. These cases began receiving public attention beginning in the mid-1980s...
  
  
• List of Christian evangelist scandals
• List of scandals with "-gate" suffix
• Sex scandal
  Sex scandal
  A sex scandal is a scandal involving allegations or information about possibly-immoral sexual activities being made public. Sex scandals are often associated with movie stars, politicians, famous athletes or others in the public eye, and become scandals largely because of the prominence of the...
  
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