obfuscate
OB-fuh-skaytverbMeaning to make something confusing or unclear on purpose
Memory hook OB-FUSC: make it DARK and murky. To slip away, the octopus squirts a cloud of dark ink until no one can see a thing; making things murky on purpose is to obfuscate.
The instructions were so full of jargon that they seemed meant to obfuscate rather than explain.
In context Rather than admit the mistake, the company tried to obfuscate it, burying one honest sentence inside forty pages of technical language.
Similar obscure, confuse, cloud, muddy
Opposite clarify, explain, elucidate
From Latin obfuscare, “to darken”: ob- (over) + fuscus (dark).