Safeguards Based on Copyable Context Cannot Provide Reliable Safety for LLMs
Summary
This paper argues that LLM safeguards based on copyable context cannot reliably ensure safety, presenting a safety trilemma among useful capability, reliable safety, and open access, and suggesting trusted credentials as a complementary mechanism.
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Paper page - Safeguards Based on Copyable Context Cannot Provide Reliable Safety for LLMs
Source: https://huggingface.co/papers/2607.27951
Abstract
Largelanguagemodelsafeguardsdecidewhethertoanswerbeforeseeinghowananswerwillbeused.Thiscreatesabasicproblemfordual-usetasks:thesameanswercanhelpanauthorizedprofessionaloranattacker,whileanattackercanimitateabenignrequestandinteractionhistory.Weseparatethecapabilityreleasedbythemodelfromtheevidenceavailableaboutdownstreamuse.Whenthatevidenceiscopyable,wederivetheexactworst-caseflooronattackerassistancewhilepreservingusefulanswers.Theresultyieldsasafetytrilemma:UsefulCapability,ReliableSafety,andOpenAccesscannotcoexist.Wethenshowhowatrustedcredentialcancomplementexistingsafeguardsbyaddinghard-to-copyinformationthatpredictsactualdownstreamuse,andidentifythestrongerconditionneededtoeliminatethefloor.Evidencefromdual-useevaluations,adaptiveattacks,anddeployedtrusted-accessprogramssupportsthepracticalrelevanceoftheseconditions.
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