bad actor

noun

plural bad actors

: a person, group, country, etc. who purposely and usually repeatedly engages in very bad behavior (such as committing crimes or causing harm to others)

Giving users a way to prove that they're being harassed with, say, a screenshot or some other form of authentication could help Twitter catch bad actors, even after they've covered their tracks.

—Issie Lapowsky

A perennial diplomatic bad actor, North Korea has already rattled its sabers at the opening of the Obama administration.

—Alex Kingsbury

"We've got to break away from the notion," as the U.A.W.'s [United Auto Workers] director of public relations, Peter G. Laarman, puts it, "that labor is a 'bad actor' in the economy. …"

—Harry Stein

also : something that causes trouble, danger, or a problem

The bad actor in male pattern hair loss is DHT, a metabolic product of testosterone.

—Jane E. Brody

We have special ducts throughout the vapor bath that carry away all the toxic bad actors.

—PC Today

Examples of bad actor in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

There are constantly bad actors out there looking for opportunities to victimize others, Robinson said. —Arkansas Online, 26 Sep. 2025

Older adults have long been susceptible to misinformation by bad actors preying on people who are isolated and may have less experience with new technologies than their younger family members. —Suzi Morales, Parents, 25 Sep. 2025

One bad actor could undo years of careful progress. —Adam Frank, Big Think, 25 Sep. 2025

At its worst, AI can be used by bad actors and content farms to confuse or deceive listeners, push ‘slop’ into the ecosystem, and interfere with authentic artists working to build their careers. —Abid Rahman, HollywoodReporter, 25 Sep. 2025

Word History

First Known Use

1879, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for bad actor

• attractor
• cofactor
• compactor
• contactor
• contractor
• distractor
• extractor
• impactor
• protractor
• reactor
• redactor
• refractor