Vulnerability of large language models to prompt injection when providing medical advice

JAMA Network Open

2025-12-19

(Press-News.org) About The Study: In this quality improvement study using a controlled simulation, commercial large language models (LLM’s) demonstrated substantial vulnerability to prompt-injection attacks (i.e., maliciously crafted inputs that manipulate an LLM’s behavior) that could generate clinically dangerous recommendations; even flagship models with advanced safety mechanisms showed high susceptibility. These findings underscore the need for adversarial robustness testing, system-level safeguards, and regulatory oversight before clinical deployment.

Corresponding Author: To contact the corresponding author, Jungyo Suh, MD, email uro_jun@amc.seoul.kr.

To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link https://media.jamanetwork.com/

(doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2025.49963)

Editor’s Note: Please see the article for additional information, including other authors, author contributions and affiliations, conflict of interest and financial disclosures, and funding and support.

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About JAMA Network Open: JAMA Network Open is an online-only open access general medical journal from the JAMA Network. On weekdays, the journal publishes peer-reviewed clinical research and commentary in more than 40 medical and health subject areas. Every article is free online from the day of publication.

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Vulnerability of large language models to prompt injection when providing medical advice

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