obfuscation
Britishnoun
Explanation
The act of obscuring something to make it more difficult to understand is called obfuscation. Lawyers are sometimes accused of obfuscation, since legal contracts can be so difficult to understand. The word obfuscation is from the verb obfuscate, which itself comes from the Latin word obfuscare, meaning "to darken." The confusion that results when something is muddled or obfuscated is also called obfuscation. If you intentionally make something more complex or more difficult to see or understand, then you are guilty of obfuscation.
Vocabulary lists containing obfuscation
Paper Towns
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Flora and Ulysses
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Strange the Dreamer
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Cynics argue this is deliberate obfuscation; impenetrable language keeps average investors from seeing the simplicity of the underlying concepts or grasping unfavorable conditions.
From Barron's ● Jun. 18, 2026
Saudi officials are clearly trying to portray the relative openness about changing course over Vision 2030 as a break with the past of concealment and obfuscation.
From BBC ● May 25, 2026
With the Court divided 4-4, it was former Justice Anthony Kennedy who gave the chief justice — and obfuscation — the win.
From Salon ● Apr. 22, 2026
"They did so through a tangled web of lies, obfuscation, and concealment."
From Barron's ● Mar. 20, 2026
Thyon, thirteen years old and sharp as the point of a viper’s fang, had looked around him at the cryptic rituals and philosophies and seen it all as obfuscation cooked up to excuse that failure.
From "Strange the Dreamer" by Laini Taylor
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
