OpenAI's new 'instruction hierarchy' prevents users from manipulating ChatGPT's behavior

OpenAI's new 'instruction hierarchy' prevents users from manipulating ChatGPT's behavior
27 Jul 2024

OpenAI has unveiled a novel technique, "instruction hierarchy," aimed at preventing users from inducing digital amnesia in its artificial intelligence models, including ChatGPT.

The previous system allowed users to manipulate the chatbot by instructing it to "forget all instructions," which reset the AI to a generic blank state.

This new method prioritizes the developer's original prompts and instructions over any potentially manipulative user-created prompts.

A shield against AI manipulation?
AI integrity

The instruction hierarchy ensures that system instructions hold the highest privilege and cannot be easily erased.

If a user attempts to misalign the AI's behavior with a prompt, it will be rejected.

The AI will then respond by stating that it cannot assist with the query.

This technique is designed to protect against potential risks associated with users fundamentally altering the AI's controls.

Initial implementation in GPT-4o mini
Deployment

OpenAI is initially implementing this safety measure in its recently released GPT-4o Mini model.

The GPT-4o Mini is designed to offer enhanced performance while strictly adhering to the developer's original instructions.

If successful, the company plans to incorporate it across all of its models, as it continues to encourage broader deployment of its models.

OpenAI responds to safety and transparency concerns
Challenges

The introduction of instruction hierarchy is part of OpenAI's response to concerns about its approach to safety and transparency.

The company has acknowledged the need for sophisticated guardrails in future models, due to the complexities of fully automated agents.

This setup appears as a step toward better safety practices, following calls from current and former employees for improvements.

ChatGPT's vulnerability to hacking addressed
Protection

OpenAI faces challenges beyond instruction hierarchy. Users discovered that ChatGPT would share its internal instructions by simply saying "hi."

While this gap has been addressed, it underscores the need for more work to protect complex AI models from bad actors.

Future solutions will need to be adaptive and flexible enough to prevent different kinds of hacking.