Word.ws English Dictionary

dark figure

dark figure noun: the estimated number of unreported criminal cases.

Noun

dark figure (plural dark figures)

  1. The estimated number of unreported criminal cases.
    • In exploring the dark figure of crime, the primary question is not how much of it becomes revealed but rather what will be the selective properties of any particular innovation for its illumination.1977, US Congressional House Committee on the Judiciary, Subcommittee on Crime, Suspension of the National Crime Survey, page 15
    • The dark figure concerning these criminal offences, is very high and the attitude towards reporting such cases is not constant.1992, Hisao Katoh, Louise I. Shelley, Hisao Katō, Hans-Günther Heiland, Crime and Control in Comparative Perspectives, Walter de Gruyter, page 49

Examples of dark figure in a sentence

  • By definition, they ignore the unreported “dark figure” of crime.2000, Piers Beirne, James W. Messerschmidt, Criminology:
  • Arguing that the dark figure is larger, perhaps very large (“The cases we know about are just the tip of the iceberg!”), makes any estimate seem possible, even reasonable.2012, Joel Best, Damned Lies and Statistics […] , University of California Press, →ISBN, page 37:

Forms of dark figure

pluraldark figures

Origin of dark figure

Calque of German Dunkelziffer.

Questions about dark figure

What does dark figure mean?
Dark figure means the estimated number of unreported criminal cases.
How do you use dark figure in a sentence?
By definition, they ignore the unreported “dark figure” of crime.
What part of speech is dark figure?
Dark figure is a noun.
What is the plural of dark figure?
The plural of dark figure is dark figures.

Words near dark figure in the dictionary

  1. dark factories
  2. dark factory
  3. dark fantasy
  4. dark fiber
  5. dark fibre
  6. dark figure
  7. dark figures
  8. dark fleet
  9. dark fleets
  10. dark flight
  11. dark flights

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: dark figure (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “dark figure.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/dark_figure. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.