exfiltrate

/ˈɛksfɪltɹeɪt/

exfiltrate verb: to withdraw (troops, operatives, etc.) surreptitiously from a dangerous position.

Verb

exfiltrate (third-person singular simple present exfiltrates, present participle exfiltrating, simple past and past participle exfiltrated)

(transitive) To withdraw (troops, operatives, etc.) surreptitiously from a dangerous position.
- [B]ack in 2017, the CIA had exfiltrated a long-standing source who worked for Putin’s foreign policy chief and had been passing the agency secrets for years. There may be others still in place.2026 February 20, The Guardian
(transitive, computer security) To covertly extract data.
- There are multiple ways to exfiltrate files from a compromised system. Since you have ssh access, you can always use sftp or scp, but I want to show you another way of moving files using netcat.2019 December 5, Course Hero, page 3

exfiltrate (plural exfiltrates)

Verb
third-person singular present	exfiltrates
present participle	exfiltrating
past participle	exfiltrated
past	exfiltrated
Noun
plural	exfiltrates

After infiltrate.

What does exfiltrate mean?: Exfiltrate means to withdraw (troops, operatives, etc.) surreptitiously from a dangerous position.
What part of speech is exfiltrate?: Exfiltrate can be a verb or a noun.
How do you pronounce exfiltrate?: Exfiltrate is pronounced /ˈɛksfɪltɹeɪt/.
What is the past tense of exfiltrate?: The past tense of exfiltrate is exfiltrated.

Adapted from Wiktionary: exfiltrate (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-exfiltrate.wav.

Cite this entry: “exfiltrate.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/exfiltrate. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.