I get the impression that every AI lab is desperately trying to figure out how to unambiguously separate instructions from data in their token streams. The fact that they haven't managed to yet suggests to me that it's a very, very difficult problem.

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27183 8 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I think what's interesting here is that they've shipped the product despite these glaring security flaws. I've noticed that in my own professional life, at some point after the pandemic people stopped caring about security as much. Issues that would have (and should have) blocked a product launch were swept under the rug.

I suspect this comes with the territory of enshittification. As an industry we're trying to wring every last dollar from every last eyeball and we've discovered that building secure systems doesn't actually move the needle very much.

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simoncion 9 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

> I get the impression that every AI lab is desperately trying...

Of course.

I wonder how we managed way back in the day to produce systems that can handle untrusted inputs and reliably instruct a dumb-as-bricks CPU what to do based on those inputs. Must have been black magic lost to the mists of time.

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famouswaffles 6 hours ago | parent | next [-]

>reliably instruct a dumb-as-bricks CPU

Yeah...a "dumb as bricks CPU", which is obviously something frontier llms are demonstrably not. Like, you're not making any sense here. None of the things that make this possible with CPUs is remotely relevant here, and the fact that you don't seem to understand this but act so smug is strange.

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simoncion 6 hours ago | parent [-]

> Yeah...a "dumb as bricks CPU", which is obviously something frontier llms are demonstrably not.

Just as the immense amount of scaffolding around the dumb-as-bricks CPU enables extremely sophisticated and useful things to be done with that pile of fused sand and copper, the immense amount of scaffolding around the dumb-as-bricks LLM enables very sophisticated and useful things to be done with that pile of linear algebra.

Don't confuse the infrastructure that makes the stupid bit in the middle actually useful with the stupid bit in the middle.

	▲	famouswaffles 5 hours ago \| parent [-]
		LLMs are not the "stupid bit in the middle." They're almost the entire value. LLMs were wildly useful before any sort of scaffolding. They are not "dumb as bricks". They are highly capable, flexible, intelligent prediction machines. The only one confused here is you, and you've still not managed to tell us in an actionable way how exactly CPU scaffolding is relevant here. Tell us, if it's so easy, or make your millions selling it. We're all waiting. I'll give you a hint. CPUs never had to interpret the meaning of arbitrary content in order to do their job, and LLMs do.

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simonw 8 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

If you can figure out how to separate instructions from data in LLMs you should ship the first agent system that's guaranteed protected against prompt injection. You'll make millions.

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skydhash 7 hours ago | parent | next [-]

It’s pretty simple. Both the intake and the output of the LLMs are data and they shouldn’t drive an actuator system (their output shouldn’t be instruction). We already have the same structure in organizations where there’s an army of analysts for information gathering and processing and then the executive department tasked with decisions.

We have even observed that the most effective LLM usage is when paired with an expert in charge of the goals. Dark factory and other automated harnesses (specs engineering and what not) seem to be a dead end. The most impactful approach to this date is an interactive conversation as a succession of small and verifiable tasks.

	▲	6 hours ago \| parent [-]
		[deleted]

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simoncion 6 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Yeah, this matches what I've learned over the past couple of years from reading some of your blog posts and reading your interactions in comment threads here and elsewhere. You're a politician, rather than a truthseeker.

The absolute most I've seen from you in response to an extensive teardown of your argument, supporting evidence, and subsequent conversational judo was a «Wow. That was well phrased.» and no subsequent change in your publicly-expressed opinions.

I'd do more than gesture at the relevant lesson taught to us by Google Fiber, Tesla, SpaceX, etc., but you'd not be publicly moved, so it's a waste of time.

	▲	simonw 6 hours ago \| parent [-]
		> You're a politician, rather than a truthseeker. Justify that. Also, which "extensive teardown" are you talking about there?