Subj : Prompt injection attacks might 'never be properly mitigated' UK N
To   : All
From : TechnologyDaily
Date : Tue Dec 09 2025 15:15:07

Prompt injection attacks might 'never be properly mitigated' UK NCSC warns

Date:
Tue, 09 Dec 2025 14:40:00 +0000

Description:
Prompt injection and SQL injection are two entirely different beasts, with 
the former being more of a "confusable deputy".

FULL STORY
======================================================================UKs 
NCSC warns prompt injection attacks may never be fully mitigated due to LLM 
design Unlike SQL injection, LLMs lack separation between instructions and 
data, making them inherently vulnerable Developers urged to treat LLMs as 
confusable deputies and design systems that limit compromised outputs 

Prompt injection attacks, meaning attempts to manipulate a large language 
model (LLM) by embedding hidden or malicious instructions inside 
user-provided content, might never be properly mitigated. 

This is according to the UKs National Cyber Security Centres (NCSC) Technical 
Director for Platforms Research, David C, who published the assessment in a 
blog assessing the technique. In the article, he argues that many compare 
prompt injection to SQL injection, which is inaccurate, since the former is 
fundamentally different and arguably more dangerous. 

The key difference between the two is the fact that LLMs dont enforce any 
real separation between instructions and data. 

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offer. View Deal Inherently confusable deputies 

Whilst initially reported as command execution, the underlying issue has 
turned out to be more fundamental than classic client/server vulnerabilities, 
he writes. Current large language models ( LLMs ) simply do not enforce a 
security boundary between instructions and data inside a prompt." 

Prompt injection attacks are regularly reported in systems that use 
generative AI (genAI), and are the OWASPs #1 attack to consider when 
developing and securing generative AI and large language model applications. 

In classical vulnerabilities, data and instructions are handled differently, 
but LLMs operate purely on next-token prediction, meaning they cannot 
inherently distinguish user-supplied data from operational instructions. 
There's a good chance prompt injection will never be properly mitigated in 
the same way, he added. 

The NCSC official also argues that the industry is repeating the same 
mistakes it made in the early 2000s, when SQL injection was poorly 
understood, and thus widely exploited. 

But, SQL injection was ultimately better understood, and new safeguards 
became standard. For LLMs, developers should treat them as inherently 
confusable deputies, and thus design systems that limit the consequences of 
compromised outputs. 

If an application cannot tolerate residual risk, he warns, it may simply not 
be an appropriate use case for an LLM. 

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======================================================================
Link to news story:
https://www.techradar.com/pro/security/prompt-injection-attacks-might-never-be
-properly-mitigated-uk-ncsc-warns


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