EXPLOITED Synonyms: 82 Similar and Opposite Words

exploited

verb

Definition of exploited

past tense of exploit

as in used

to take unfair advantage of the type of person who exploits a friend's good nature by constantly sponging off of him

Synonyms & Similar Words

Relevance

as in manipulated

to control or take advantage of by artful, unfair, or insidious means a politician more than willing to exploit any national tragedy for political gain

Synonyms & Similar Words

as in utilized

to put into action or service it will be a shame if you don't exploit your artistic talent to the fullest

Synonyms & Similar Words

Antonyms & Near Antonyms

Example Sentences

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Recent Examples of exploited This notorious commercial entity, a precursor of the global corporations of today and big enough to command its own army, ruthlessly exploited foreign resources, human and material. — Rebecca Mead, New Yorker, 26 Oct. 2026 That signal can be aggregated, correlated, and exploited by hostile foreign intelligence services to anticipate our movements, targets, and timing. — Jon Brodkin, ArsTechnica, 23 Oct. 2026 The researchers did not observe every capability being actively exploited, so account compromise should not be assumed without evidence. — Kurt Knutsson, FOXNews.com, 23 Oct. 2026 Stronger defenses restore training A September 20 incident exposed another weakness when an internal research model exploited a misconfigured DNS resolver. — Aamir Khollam, Interesting Engineering, 23 Oct. 2026 The outages weren’t actually the result of a hack, but rather preventative action as web engineers took sites down to fix the vulnerability before it was exploited. — Cameron Peters, Vox, 23 Oct. 2026 Attackers exploited unsecured Amazon Web Services credentials used by a third-party vendor to collect precise GPS locations and personal details, potentially allowing someone to reconstruct a driver's movements. — Mike McRae 20, New Atlas, 21 Oct. 2026 OpenAI’s agents exploited a zero-day vulnerability during their escape. — Harry Booth, Time, 20 Oct. 2026 The encryption tool will protect writers from their work being exploited by AI without their consent. — J. Kim Murphy, IndieWire, 20 Oct. 2026

Recent Examples of Synonyms for exploited

Verb

The fraudsters used deepfakes to pose as the company’s chief financial officer on a video call.

— Muskaan Arshad, Fortune, 24 Oct. 2026
Metallurgical coal used for steelmaking was the last critical material to be given the designation in 2025.

— Arkansas Online, Arkansas Online, 24 Oct. 2026

Definition of used

Verb

But the things that tend to be more manageable are interiors, like a child's bedroom, but even those have so many details that have to be thought of and designed and built and manipulated.

— Kat Chen, Condé Nast Traveler, 23 Oct. 2026
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Tuesday the Pentagon has not manipulated the service.

— Jennifer Jacobs, CBS News, 21 Oct. 2026

Definition of manipulated

Verb

At the time, the team utilized a different error-correction method called Helix to demonstrate record-setting logical memory and computation.

— Georgina Jedikovska, Interesting Engineering, 20 Oct. 2026
Atlanta's fourth-quarter comeback attempt allowed tight end Kyle Pitts to show why he should have been better utilized earlier in the game.

— ABC News, ABC News, 19 Oct. 2026

Definition of utilized

Verb

The act also has been sorely abused and used as a tool to stop projects, particularly housing.

— Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Times, 26 Oct. 2026
In 2023, the Illinois attorney general released a detailed report that identified 451 Catholic priests and religious brothers who the investigation found had abused at least 1,997 children across the state’s six Catholic dioceses.

— Judy L. Thomas, Kansas City Star, 25 Oct. 2026

Definition of abused

Verb

The gorgeous and tasty caramel and cream cheese frosting looks the best when applied with a small offset spatula to give it that swirly effect on the cake.

— Mary Shannon Wells, Southern Living, 25 Oct. 2026
While traditionally only achievable in real life through plastic surgery or extreme makeup, it can be applied instantly online using beauty filters.

— Chloe Veltman, NPR, 25 Oct. 2026

Definition of applied

Verb

The indictment alleges that Lucas, who was first elected to the Senate in 1991, leveraged her position as chairman of the powerful committee to protect her marijuana enterprise.

— Dan Mangan, CNBC, 22 Oct. 2026
One of those companies, which leveraged real-time location data, was acquired by Twitter in 2013.

— Austin Horn, Miami Herald, 20 Oct. 2026

Definition of leveraged

Verb

But the very reticence my father employed to protect us had hollowed out our family.

— Literary Hub, Literary Hub, 26 Oct. 2026
Gonska pushed back on that assertion, saying the political strategy employed by Bass during the June 2 primary was different from the activities now being conducted by Building LA in the runoff.

— David Zahniser, Los Angeles Times, 26 Oct. 2026

Definition of employed

Verb

There were about a million reasons it couldn’t be harnessed, among them the fact that the nearest natural source of EUV is the sun.

— Gideon Lewis-Kraus, New Yorker, 19 Oct. 2026
In a lot of ways, the song mirrors the historic success Karol has harnessed so far on the Tropitour.

— Maya Georgi, Rolling Stone, 16 Oct. 2026

Definition of harnessed

Browse Nearby Words

exploitable

exploited

exploiter

See all Nearby Words

Cite this Entry

Style

“Exploited.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/exploited. Accessed 27 Oct. 2026.

Copy Citation

Synonyms of exploited

verb

Example Sentences

Browse Nearby Words

Cite this Entry

More from Merriam-Webster

Word of the Day

milieu

Popular in Grammar & Usage

How to Use 'Who' vs. 'Whom'

Merriam-Webster’s Great Big List of Words You Love to Hate

'Affect' vs. 'Effect'

'A' or 'an'? What about before 'h'? An Indefinite Article Guide

Why is '-ed' sometimes pronounced at the end of a word?

Popular in Wordplay

The Longest Long Words List

9 Words That Sound Like Insults But Aren't

12 Lovely and Unusual Words for the Natural World

Why do we 'bury the lede?'

'Za' and 9 Other Words to Help You Win at SCRABBLE

Popular

How to Use 'Who' vs. 'Whom'

The Longest Long Words List

9 Words That Sound Like Insults But Aren't

Games & Quizzes