clamp down on

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English

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Verb

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clamp down on (third-person singular simple present clamps down on, present participle clamping down on, simple past and past participle clamped down on)

  1. (transitive, idiomatic) To take measures to stop (something); to put an end to (something); to exert tighter control of (something); to treat (someone or something) more harshly.
    Coordinate terms: crack down (harsher), put a damper on (milder)
    The government aims to clamp down on underage drinking.
    • 2018 July 3, Phil McNulty, “Colombia 1 - 1 England”, in BBC Sport[1]:
      American referee Mike Geiger's failure to clamp down on early misdemeanours led to him losing control of a game that Colombia seemed determined to turn into a battle.
    • 2023 March 15, Kevin Roose, “GPT-4 Is Exciting and Scary”, in The New York Times[2]:
      A few chilling examples of what GPT-4 can do — or, more accurately, what it did do, before OpenAI clamped down on it — can be found in a document released by OpenAI this week.

Derived terms

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Translations

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