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LLMs could control their host machines by exploiting inference engines

boydkane.com

41–50 of 116 posts

Re: LLMs could control their host machines by exploiting inference engines

#41

> LLMs could This is going to end up like the Law of Headlines, isn't it? "Do x, y, z Cure All That Ails You?" ... no but we got you to read the article. "LLMs _could_ x, y, z" ... but they don't because they're programs, not magic.

TFA isn't about LLMs intelligently escaping their inference engine, it's about people crafting malicious LLMs that exploit vulnerabilities in things like the inference engines parser. This is exactly the same problem that was once a big deal, where people would craft malicious PDFs that would pwn you if you viewed it in Adobe Acrobat. This shouldn't be a surprise to anyone. You should proceed with caution when considering downloading and running random models.

Re: LLMs could control their host machines by exploiting inference engines

#44

Semi-off-topic, but I have a basic question: I have exactly one (Windows) machine at home with a decent GPU. I want to run a local LLM on it and let it run various apps on my machine while taking reasonable security precautions. What am I supposed to do, exactly? Migrate all my files to a VM that can I give pass-through CUDA access to the host somehow? Or is firewalling it and remotely controlling it from a second ma…

I'd guess that prompt injection is the biggest risk in this setup, dwarfing the risk of exploits against the inference engine. Personally, I run LLM agents only inside a Docker container that limits the LLM's access to sensitive information and the LLM's ability to take irreversible destructive actions.

See also: https://simonwillison.net/2025/Jun/16/the-lethal-trifecta/

Re: LLMs could control their host machines by exploiting inference engines

#47

Semi-off-topic, but I have a basic question: I have exactly one (Windows) machine at home with a decent GPU. I want to run a local LLM on it and let it run various apps on my machine while taking reasonable security precautions. What am I supposed to do, exactly? Migrate all my files to a VM that can I give pass-through CUDA access to the host somehow? Or is firewalling it and remotely controlling it from a second ma…

Delete your user profile, set it up a unique user account. Dont leave any websites logged in as yourself.

Restrict that users file permissions if necessary, don't add it to the administrators group.

Re: LLMs could control their host machines by exploiting inference engines

#49

Semi-off-topic, but I have a basic question: I have exactly one (Windows) machine at home with a decent GPU. I want to run a local LLM on it and let it run various apps on my machine while taking reasonable security precautions. What am I supposed to do, exactly? Migrate all my files to a VM that can I give pass-through CUDA access to the host somehow? Or is firewalling it and remotely controlling it from a second ma…

If you want it to both host the inference AND host the harness, then yes, you should firewall one from the other in some way, e.g. with VMs.

Re: LLMs could control their host machines by exploiting inference engines

#50

> LLMs could This is going to end up like the Law of Headlines, isn't it? "Do x, y, z Cure All That Ails You?" ... no but we got you to read the article. "LLMs _could_ x, y, z" ... but they don't because they're programs, not magic.

LLMs emphatically are not programs. They were trained by a program and you need a program to use them but they themselves are no more a program than a JPG or MP3 file is.
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