sitting ducks
Defenseless, vulnerable ones
Sitting ducks are easy targets—people or things vulnerable to attack, criticism, or exploitation because they cannot or do not defend themselves.
The phrase evokes the image of ducks resting on water, unable to escape a hunter as quickly as ducks in flight.
Without proper security, the company's servers were sitting ducks for hackers.
The term nearly always appears in the plural and typically follows a linking verb: We were sitting ducks out there.
- easy markReadily deceived person
- easy targetsReadily exploited victims
- soft targetsUnprotected sites for attacks
- easy pickingsEffortlessly obtained gains
- trappedUnable to escape
vulnerable · defenseless · wide open · suckers · helpless · low-hanging fruit · prey · Achilles' heel · cannon fodder · dead meat · in the crosshairs · open season · fair game · ambush · weak · targets · exposed · unprotected
sitting ducksfortified positions
Defensively reinforced military locations
invulnerable · safe havens · impregnable · protected · secure
sitting ducksmoving targets
Objectives that keep changing
greased lightning · fleet-footed · slippery · evasive · nimble
sitting ducksapex predators
Dominant hunters, no natural enemies
predators · hunters · armed and dangerous · aggressors · hornets' nests
duck, sits, sitter, sitters, sitting, ducks, ducked, ducking, duckling