ferret out

phrasal verb

ferreted out; ferreting out; ferrets out
: to find (something, such as information) by careful searching
He's good at ferreting out the facts.

Examples of ferret out in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web
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When this sort of explanation is merely an excuse for gender discrimination, courts ferret out the real reason and punish the culprit. Thomas G. Moukawsher, MSNBC Newsweek, 2 Sep. 2025 Taxpayers who believe that enforcement and compliance aren’t as important to tax authorities as before may be caught by surprise, especially as the government increasingly relies on data analytics to ferret out trends and flag outliers. Kelly Phillips Erb, Forbes.com, 11 Aug. 2025 And the state has just embarked on its DOGE effort to ferret out wasteful spending. Anthony Man, Sun Sentinel, 8 Aug. 2025 His first book on the subject was about Aldrich Ames, the Soviet mole inside the C.I.A., who, before finally being ferreted out by the F.B.I., in 1994, handed over the identities of dozens of agency assets. Keith Gessen, New Yorker, 16 July 2025 See All Example Sentences for ferret out

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Cite this Entry

“Ferret out.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ferret%20out. Accessed 9 Sep. 2025.

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