Trust refers to confidence in or reliance on some person or quality. It commonly describes dependence upon something in the future; hope, confidence in the future payment for goods or services supplied; credit, and that which is committed or entrusted; something received in confidence; a charge, which gives the term a broader and more practical sense than a single short definition would suggest. Depending on context, it can also point to that upon which confidence is reposed; ground of reliance; hope, trustworthiness, reliability, and the condition or obligation of one to whom anything is confided; responsible charge or office, so the category can cover literal uses, related ideas, and more figurative extensions of the same core meaning. Taken together, these meanings present Trust as a flexible theme rather than a narrowly technical label, covering the central idea people usually mean when they use the word while still leaving room for closely related senses that appear in real language. Additional shades of meaning include the confidence vested in a person who has legal ownership of a property to manage for the benefit of another, an estate devised or granted in confidence that the devisee or grantee shall convey it, or dispose of the profits, at the will, or for the benefit, of another; an estate held for the use of another, a group of businessmen or traders organised for mutual benefit to produce and distribute specific commodities or services, and managed by a central body of trustees, affirmation of the access rights of a user of a computer system, and secure, safe, which reinforce how the category can stretch across adjacent but still recognizable uses of the same term.
