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Text Prompt Injection of Vision Language Models

Authors: Ruizhe Zhu

Published: 2025-10-10

arXiv ID: 2510.09849v1

Added to Library: 2025-11-11 14:19 UTC

Red Teaming

📄 Abstract

The widespread application of large vision language models has significantly raised safety concerns. In this project, we investigate text prompt injection, a simple yet effective method to mislead these models. We developed an algorithm for this type of attack and demonstrated its effectiveness and efficiency through experiments. Compared to other attack methods, our approach is particularly effective for large models without high demand for computational resources.

🔍 Key Points

  • Introduction of text prompt injection as a novel attack method against vision language models (VLMs) that is both efficient and effective.
  • Development of a systematic algorithm for executing text prompt injection attacks, focusing on optimizing placement and embedding techniques for injected prompts.
  • Demonstration through experiments that text prompt injection significantly outperforms traditional gradient-based attacks (e.g., PGD) across various models and parameters.
  • Identification of a correlation between the effectiveness of the attack and the number of parameters in the VLMs, highlighting the requirement for large models to successfully execute the attack.
  • Insightful analysis of background color consistency in images and its impact on the readability and effectiveness of injected prompts.

💡 Why This Paper Matters

This paper is crucial in understanding the vulnerabilities of large vision language models to text prompt injection attacks, a methodology that poses significant implications in the field of AI security. By providing a robust algorithm and experimental validation, the research contributes to the growing discussion on the safety and reliability of AI systems, especially in applications involving multimodal inputs. The insights presented pave the way for future investigations into both offensive and defensive strategies against such vulnerabilities.

🎯 Why It's Interesting for AI Security Researchers

This paper will be of great interest to AI security researchers due to its exploration of a relatively under-examined attack vector in the rapidly evolving field of multimodal AI. The findings highlight significant security risks associated with text prompt injection in VLMs, which could have real-world ramifications in numerous applications. Researchers focused on adversarial attacks, model robustness, and safety mechanisms can leverage the methods and insights provided to develop new defenses, improve model resilience, and build safer AI systems.

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