5 ms·
Some quick thoughts: 1. Given the availability of both LLAMA and training techniques like LORA, we're well past the stage where people should be able to get aw
by danShumway 3y ago
Some quick thoughts:
1. Given the availability of both LLAMA and training techniques like LORA, we're well past the stage where people should be able to get away with "prove this wouldn't work" arguments. Anyone with a hundred dollars or so to spare could fine-tune LLAMA using the methods you're talking about and prove that this technique does work. But nobody across the entire Internet has provided that proof. In other words, talk is cheap.
2. From a functionality perspective, separating context isn't a perfect solution because LLMs are called to process text within user context, so it's not as simple as just saying "don't process anything between these lines." You generally do want to process the stuff between those lines and that opens you up to vulnerabilities. Let's say you can separate system prompts and user prompts. You're still vulnerable to data poisoning, you're still vulnerable to redefining words, etc...
3. People sometimes compare LLMs to humans. I don't like the comparison, but lets roll with it for a second. If your point of view is that these things can exhibit human-level performance, then you have to ask: given that humans themselves can't be trained to fully avoid phishing attacks and malicious instructions, what's special about an LLM that would make it more capable than a human being at separating context?
4. But there's a growing body of evidence that RHLF training can not result in 100% guarantees about output at all. We don't really have any examples of RHLF training that's resulted in a behavior that the LLM can't be broken out of. So why assume that this specific RHLF technique would have different performance than all of the other RHLF tuning we've done?
In your linked comment, you say:
> Perhaps there are some fancy exploits which would still bamboozle the model, but those could be ironed out over time with improved fine-tuning, similar to how OpenAI managed to make ChatGPT-4 mostly resistant to "jailbreaks".
But GPT-4 is not mostly resistant to jailbreaking. It's still pretty vulnerable. We don't have any evidence that RHLF tuning is good enough to actually restrict a model for security purposes.
5. Finally, let's say that you're right. That would be a very good thing. But it wouldn't change anything about the present. Even if you're right and you can tune a model to avoid prompt injection, none of the current models people are building on top of are tuned in that way. So they're still vulnerable and this is still a pretty big deal. We're still in a world where none of the current models have defenses against this, and yet we're building applications on top of them that are dangerous.
So I don't think people pointing out that problem are over-exaggerating. All of the current models are vulnerable.
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But ultimately, I go back to #1. Everyone on the Internet has access to LLAMA now. We're no longer in a world where only OpenAI can try things. Is it weird to you that nobody has plunked down a couple hundred dollars and demonstrated a working example of the defense you propose?
- simonw 3y agoYeah, that's why I don't think there's an easy fix for this. A lot of talented, well funded teams have strong financial and reputational motivation to figure this out. This has been the case for more than six months now.
- cubefox 3y agoBing Chat, the first model to use external content in its context, was only released three months ago. Microsoft is also generally not very good at fine-tuning, as we have seen with their heavy reliance on using an elaborate custom prompt instead of more extensive fine-tuning. And OpenAI has released their browsing plugin only recently. So this is not a lot of time really. I know Bing Chat talks like a pirate when it reads a compromising website, but I'm not sure the ChatGPT browsing plugin has even been shown to be vulnerable to prompt injection. Perhaps they have already fixed it? In any case, I don't think there is a big obstacle.
- danShumway 3y ago> but I'm not sure the ChatGPT browsing plugin has even been shown to be vulnerable to prompt injection https://embracethered.com/blog/posts/2023/chatgpt-plugin-youtube-indirect-prompt-injection/ https://embracethered.com/blog/posts/2023/chatgpt-plugin-you... was posted in a Discord group I'm a part of this morning, demonstrating indirect prompt injection working in a ChatGPT plugin. I see a lot of responses when talking about prompt injection where people keep asking, "okay, but is this new thing vulnerable?" And then eventually it's shown to be vulnerable, and then they just move on to the next new thing. Like, I already know the response here is going to be "okay, but are specifically ChatGPT-4 plugins vulnerable?" At this point, the answer is yes until the answer is demonstrated to be no -- at the very least, the answer is yes until a platform can last more than a month or two without seeing a prompt injection attack succeed. This is guess-test-and-revise security, it is not how we should be approaching the problem; and after a while the conclusion has to be that there is something fundamental going wrong and that it's going to keep going wrong until something fundamental changes. If GPT-5 comes out and it's specifically trained with a new strategy, then fine, that's interesting to talk about. But do we need to have the same conversation every single time an incremental improvement happens with a model? Assuming that models are secure by default until proven otherwise is not a feasible strategy anymore.