To falsify means to change something deliberately to make it untrue or misleading. When someone falsifies a document, they might alter numbers, forge a signature, or add false information to deceive others. A student who falsifies a permission slip by signing their parent's name is creating something that looks real but isn't.

Falsifying is different from making an honest mistake. When you falsify something, you know you're making it false on purpose. A scientist who falsifies research data is committing one of the worst violations in science because other researchers depend on honest results to build their own work. A business owner who falsifies financial records to hide losses is breaking the law.

You can falsify records, documents, evidence, or data. When historians discover that an ancient artifact has been falsified, they mean someone created a fake and tried to pass it off as genuine.

Getting caught falsifying something usually has serious consequences because it destroys trust.