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

Tesfaye and Ortega model two opposing modes of imitative, hollow performance, like a bad actor’s varying notions of good acting. —Charles Bramesco, IndieWire, 15 May 2025

While its language appears aimed at bad actors, the downstream effect could destabilize the PSLF for the more than 12.8 million Americans who work at nonprofits. —Shahar Ziv, Forbes.com, 15 May 2025

The Hall of Fame, many argue, is already full of bad actors, cheaters and racists. —Paul Sullivan, Chicago Tribune, 14 May 2025

The President’s unique flavor of grievance prompts him to see the U.S. economy as a perpetual victim of economic bullies and the bearer of bad actors. —Philip Elliott, Time, 12 May 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