obfuscate

verb ob·fus·cate \ ˈäb-fə-ˌskāt ; äb-ˈfə-ˌskāt , əb- \

|Updated on: 4 Jul 2018

Examples: obfuscate in a Sentence

Editor's Note: Try to Understand the Roots of obfuscate

Definition of obfuscate

obfuscated; obfuscating

transitive verb

1 a : to throw into shadow : darken

b : to make obscure

obfuscate the issue

officials who … continue to obscure and obfuscate what happened
—Mary Carroll

2 : confuse

obfuscate the reader

intransitive verb

: to be evasive, unclear, or confusing

The suspect often obfuscated during the interrogation.

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obfuscation

play \ˌäb-(ˌ)fə-ˈskā-shən\ noun

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obfuscatory

play \äb-ˈfə-skə-ˌtȯr-ē, əb-\ adjective

See obfuscate defined for English-language learners

obfuscate was our Word of the Day on 11/17/2016. Hear the podcast!

Examples of obfuscate in a Sentence

Politicians keep obfuscating the issues.
Their explanations only serve to obfuscate and confuse.

Recent Examples of obfuscate from the Web

The nature of many dynastic fortunes — backed by decades and sometimes centuries of assets and dividends — can obfuscate the true extent of their holdings.

— Bloomberg.com, "Trillion Dollar Inheritance: The World’s Biggest Family Fortunes," 27 June 2018
The administration obfuscated about the reasons for family separation before finally caving to public pressure.

— jen kirby, Vox, "Time’s crying girl photo controversy, explained," 22 June 2018
Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen reportedly opposed it in private, yet energetically obfuscated on its behalf in public.

— jonathan chait, Daily Intelligencer, "Lessons From the Trump Family-Separation Fiasco," 20 June 2018
Democratic Representative Adam Schiff of California thanked her on Twitter for the piece—may well obfuscate the GOP’s true extremism on immigration.

— sarah jones, The New Republic, "Motherhood and the Morality of Trump’s Immigration Policy," 18 June 2018
In response to some of the most pointed queries, the company offered replies that obfuscated the issues.

— colin lecher, The Verge, "Facebook releases 500 pages of damage control in response to Senators’ questions," 11 June 2018
Fredricks says the strategy boosted Vice’s traffic from a few hundred thousand visitors per month to several million, while obfuscating who the audience actually was.

— reeves wiedeman, Daily Intelligencer, "A Company Built on a Bluff," 10 June 2018
But in others, like Maryland, incomplete record keeping has obfuscated the stories of innumerable slaves.

— terrence mccoy, Washington Post, "They thought Georgetown University’s missing slaves were ‘lost.’ The truth was closer to home than anyone knew.," 28 Apr. 2018
Integration Once the money is in the global financial system and its origins properly obfuscated, the final challenge is making the money accessible, that is, integrating it into the legitimate economy.

— garrett m. graff, WIRED, "If Trump Is Laundering Russian Money, Here’s How It Works," 11 May 2018

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'obfuscate.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Try to Understand the Roots of obfuscate

To obfuscate something means to make it so that it isn't clear or transparent, much like dirty water makes it hard to see to the bottom of a pond. The verb shares its ob- root (meaning "over, completely") with obscure, another word that can refer to the act of concealing something or making it more difficult to see or understand. The rest of obfuscate comes from Latin fuscus, which means "dark brown" and is distantly related to our word dusk.