LLM Security Management

Few Lessons from Deploying and Using LLMs in Production Deploying LLMs can feel like hiring a hyperactive genius intern—they dazzle users while potentially draining your API budget. Here are some insights I’ve gathered: 1. “Cheap” is a Lie You Tell Yourself: Cloud costs per call may seem low, but the overall expense of an LLM-based system can skyrocket. Fixes: - Cache repetitive queries: Users ask the same thing at least 100x/day - Gatekeep: Use cheap classifiers (BERT) to filter “easy” requests. Let LLMs handle only the complex 10% and your current systems handle the remaining 90%. - Quantize your models: Shrink LLMs to run on cheaper hardware without massive accuracy drops - Asynchronously build your caches — Pre-generate common responses before they’re requested or gracefully fail the first time a query comes and cache for the next time. 2. Guard Against Model Hallucinations: Sometimes, models express answers with such confidence that distinguishing fact from fiction becomes challenging, even for human reviewers. Fixes: - Use RAG - Just a fancy way of saying to provide your model the knowledge it requires in the prompt itself by querying some database based on semantic matches with the query. - Guardrails: Validate outputs using regex or cross-encoders to establish a clear decision boundary between the query and the LLM’s response. 3. The best LLM is often a discriminative model: You don’t always need a full LLM. Consider knowledge distillation: use a large LLM to label your data and then train a smaller, discriminative model that performs similarly at a much lower cost. 4. It's not about the model, it is about the data on which it is trained: A smaller LLM might struggle with specialized domain data—that’s normal. Fine-tune your model on your specific data set by starting with parameter-efficient methods (like LoRA or Adapters) and using synthetic data generation to bootstrap training. 5. Prompts are the new Features: Prompts are the new features in your system. Version them, run A/B tests, and continuously refine using online experiments. Consider bandit algorithms to automatically promote the best-performing variants. What do you think? Have I missed anything? I’d love to hear your “I survived LLM prod” stories in the comments!

Evaluating LLMs is hard. Evaluating agents is even harder. This is one of the most common challenges I see when teams move from using LLMs in isolation to deploying agents that act over time, use tools, interact with APIs, and coordinate across roles. These systems make a series of decisions, not just a single prediction. As a result, success or failure depends on more than whether the final answer is correct. Despite this, many teams still rely on basic task success metrics or manual reviews. Some build internal evaluation dashboards, but most of these efforts are narrowly scoped and miss the bigger picture. Observability tools exist, but they are not enough on their own. Google’s ADK telemetry provides traces of tool use and reasoning chains. LangSmith gives structured logging for LangChain-based workflows. Frameworks like CrewAI, AutoGen, and OpenAgents expose role-specific actions and memory updates. These are helpful for debugging, but they do not tell you how well the agent performed across dimensions like coordination, learning, or adaptability. Two recent research directions offer much-needed structure. One proposes breaking down agent evaluation into behavioral components like plan quality, adaptability, and inter-agent coordination. Another argues for longitudinal tracking, focusing on how agents evolve over time, whether they drift or stabilize, and whether they generalize or forget. If you are evaluating agents today, here are the most important criteria to measure: • 𝗧𝗮𝘀𝗸 𝘀𝘂𝗰𝗰𝗲𝘀𝘀: Did the agent complete the task, and was the outcome verifiable? • 𝗣𝗹𝗮𝗻 𝗾𝘂𝗮𝗹𝗶𝘁𝘆: Was the initial strategy reasonable and efficient? • 𝗔𝗱𝗮𝗽𝘁𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻: Did the agent handle tool failures, retry intelligently, or escalate when needed? • 𝗠𝗲𝗺𝗼𝗿𝘆 𝘂𝘀𝗮𝗴𝗲: Was memory referenced meaningfully, or ignored? • 𝗖𝗼𝗼𝗿𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 (𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗺𝘂𝗹𝘁𝗶-𝗮𝗴𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝘀𝘆𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗺𝘀): Did agents delegate, share information, and avoid redundancy? • 𝗦𝘁𝗮𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗿 𝘁𝗶𝗺𝗲: Did behavior remain consistent across runs or drift unpredictably? For adaptive agents or those in production, this becomes even more critical. Evaluation systems should be time-aware, tracking changes in behavior, error rates, and success patterns over time. Static accuracy alone will not explain why an agent performs well one day and fails the next. Structured evaluation is not just about dashboards. It is the foundation for improving agent design. Without clear signals, you cannot diagnose whether failure came from the LLM, the plan, the tool, or the orchestration logic. If your agents are planning, adapting, or coordinating across steps or roles, now is the time to move past simple correctness checks and build a robust, multi-dimensional evaluation framework. It is the only way to scale intelligent behavior with confidence.

Training a Large Language Model (LLM) involves more than just scaling up data and compute. It requires a disciplined approach across multiple layers of the ML lifecycle to ensure performance, efficiency, safety, and adaptability. This visual framework outlines eight critical pillars necessary for successful LLM training, each with a defined workflow to guide implementation: 𝟭. 𝗛𝗶𝗴𝗵-𝗤𝘂𝗮𝗹𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝗗𝗮𝘁𝗮 𝗖𝘂𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻: Use diverse, clean, and domain-relevant datasets. Deduplicate, normalize, filter low-quality samples, and tokenize effectively before formatting for training. 𝟮. 𝗦𝗰𝗮𝗹𝗮𝗯𝗹𝗲 𝗗𝗮𝘁𝗮 𝗣𝗿𝗲𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗰𝗲𝘀𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗴: Design efficient preprocessing pipelines—tokenization consistency, padding, caching, and batch streaming to GPU must be optimized for scale. 𝟯. 𝗠𝗼𝗱𝗲𝗹 𝗔𝗿𝗰𝗵𝗶𝘁𝗲𝗰𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗲 𝗗𝗲𝘀𝗶𝗴𝗻: Select architectures based on task requirements. Configure embeddings, attention heads, and regularization, and then conduct mock tests to validate the architectural choices. 𝟰. 𝗧𝗿𝗮𝗶𝗻𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗦𝘁𝗮𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗶𝘁𝘆 and 𝗢𝗽𝘁𝗶𝗺𝗶𝘇𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻: Ensure convergence using techniques such as FP16 precision, gradient clipping, batch size tuning, and adaptive learning rate scheduling. Loss monitoring and checkpointing are crucial for long-running processes. 𝟱. 𝗖𝗼𝗺𝗽𝘂𝘁𝗲 & 𝗠𝗲𝗺𝗼𝗿𝘆 𝗢𝗽𝘁𝗶𝗺𝗶𝘇𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻: Leverage distributed training, efficient attention mechanisms, and pipeline parallelism. Profile usage, compress checkpoints, and enable auto-resume for robustness. 𝟲. 𝗘𝘃𝗮𝗹𝘂𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 & 𝗩𝗮𝗹𝗶𝗱𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻: Regularly evaluate using defined metrics and baseline comparisons. Test with few-shot prompts, review model outputs, and track performance metrics to prevent drift and overfitting. 𝟳. 𝗘𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗰𝗮𝗹 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗦𝗮𝗳𝗲𝘁𝘆 𝗖𝗵𝗲𝗰𝗸𝘀: Mitigate model risks by applying adversarial testing, output filtering, decoding constraints, and incorporating user feedback. Audit results to ensure responsible outputs. 🔸 𝟴. 𝗙𝗶𝗻𝗲-𝗧𝘂𝗻𝗶𝗻𝗴 & 𝗗𝗼𝗺𝗮𝗶𝗻 𝗔𝗱𝗮𝗽𝘁𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻: Adapt models for specific domains using techniques like LoRA/PEFT and controlled learning rates. Monitor overfitting, evaluate continuously, and deploy with confidence. These principles form a unified blueprint for building robust, efficient, and production-ready LLMs—whether training from scratch or adapting pre-trained models.

Explaining the Evaluation method LLM-as-a-Judge (LLMaaJ). Token-based metrics like BLEU or ROUGE are still useful for structured tasks like translation or summarization. But for open-ended answers, RAG copilots, or complex enterprise prompts, they often miss the bigger picture. That’s where LLMaaJ changes the game. 𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗶𝘀 𝗶𝘁? You use a powerful LLM as an evaluator, not a generator. It’s given: - The original question - The generated answer - And the retrieved context or gold answer 𝗧𝗵𝗲𝗻 𝗶𝘁 𝗮𝘀𝘀𝗲𝘀𝘀𝗲𝘀: ✅ Faithfulness to the source ✅ Factual accuracy ✅ Semantic alignment—even if phrased differently 𝗪𝗵𝘆 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝗺𝗮𝘁𝘁𝗲𝗿𝘀: LLMaaJ captures what traditional metrics can’t. It understands paraphrasing. It flags hallucinations. It mirrors human judgment, which is critical when deploying GenAI systems in the enterprise. 𝗖𝗼𝗺𝗺𝗼𝗻 𝗟𝗟𝗠𝗮𝗮𝗝-𝗯𝗮𝘀𝗲𝗱 𝗺𝗲𝘁𝗿𝗶𝗰𝘀: - Answer correctness - Answer faithfulness - Coherence, tone, and even reasoning quality 📌 If you’re building enterprise-grade copilots or RAG workflows, LLMaaJ is how you scale QA beyond manual reviews. To put LLMaaJ into practice, check out EvalAssist; a new tool from IBM Research. It offers a web-based UI to streamline LLM evaluations: - Refine your criteria iteratively using Unitxt - Generate structured evaluations - Export as Jupyter notebooks to scale effortlessly A powerful way to bring LLM-as-a-Judge into your QA stack. - Get Started guide: https://lnkd.in/g4QP3-Ue - Demo Site: https://lnkd.in/gUSrV65s - Github Repo: https://lnkd.in/gPVEQRtv - Whitepapers: https://lnkd.in/gnHi6SeW

I have thousands of dollars in unused cloud credits, while a few lunch boxes like these can handle most of what I actually need. Infrastructure looks very different now, and for many things we're building in 2026 you don't need racks of servers anymore. A few of these can run web servers, APIs, and language models simultaneously, with most of the heavy lifting happening at the edge. What used to require a data center now fits under a desk. Or a kitchen table. For LLMs, it's increasingly about smarter model selection rather than raw scale. A well-tuned 32B model running locally can give you serious reasoning, coding assistance, and document generation without API latency or usage caps. The barrier to building real AI-powered applications has never been lower, and you can do it on hardware that costs less than a decent laptop used to.

The new open-source benchmark, MCP-Universe, is a useful step forward in how we evaluate LLMs. Unlike traditional benchmarks, it tests models on real enterprise tasks, like repository management and financial analysis. The latest results, though, are a wake-up call: as VentureBeat reports, GPT-5 failed in more than half of real work orchestration tasks. Not because the model isn’t powerful, but because raw model strength isn’t the same as enterprise readiness. Two challenges stood out: • Long context windows. Enterprise inputs are sprawling, incomplete, and often contradictory. Expanding the window isn’t enough. You need the right information inside it. Approaches like GraphRAG help by curating authoritative context and enabling multi-hop reasoning across knowledge. • Unfamiliar tools. LLMs struggle to adapt to proprietary formats, workflows, and security protocols. There’s a misconception that adding MCP on top of APIs will magically improve reliability. It won’t. MCP can connect systems, but that doesn’t guarantee value. Reliability comes from agents and tools built for specific jobs, grounded in a company’s own data, rules, and workflows—and from curating the right information, not just more of it. A “universal” layer doesn’t replace the need for domain-specific intelligence.

As an MLOps platform, we started by helping organizations implement responsible AI governance for traditional machine learning models. With principles of transparency, accountability, and oversight, our Guardrails enabled smooth model development. However, governing large language models (LLMs) like ChatGPT requires a fundamentally different approach. LLMs aren't narrow systems designed for specific tasks - they can generate nuanced text on virtually any topic imaginable. This presents a whole new set of challenges for governance. Here are some key components for evolving AI governance frameworks to effectively oversee large language models (LLMs): 1️⃣ Usage-Focused Governance: Focus governance efforts on real-world LLM usage - the workflows, inputs and outputs - rather than just the technical architecture. Continuously assess risks posed by different use cases. 2️⃣ Dynamic Risk Assessment: Identify unique risks presented by LLMs such as bias amplification and develop flexible frameworks to proactively address emerging issues. 3️⃣ Customized Integrations: Invest in tailored solutions to integrate complex LLMs with existing systems in alignment with governance goals. 4️⃣ Advanced Monitoring: Utilize state-of-the-art tools to monitor LLMs in real-time across metrics like outputs, bias indicators, misuse prevention, and more. 5️⃣ Continuous Accuracy Tracking: Implement ongoing processes to detect subtle accuracy drifts or inconsistencies in LLM outputs before they escalate. 6️⃣ Agile Oversight: Adopt agile, iterative governance processes to manage frequent LLM updates and retraining in line with the rapid evolution of models. 7️⃣ Enhanced Transparency: Incorporate methodologies to audit LLMs, trace outputs back to training data/prompts and pinpoint root causes of issues to enhance accountability. In conclusion, while the rise of LLMs has disrupted traditional governance models, we at Katonic AI are working hard to understand the nuances of LLM-centric governance and aim to provide effective solutions to assist organizations in harnessing the power of LLMs responsibly and efficiently. #LLMGovernance #ResponsibleLLMs #LLMrisks #LLMethics #LLMpolicy #LLMregulation #LLMbias #LLMtransparency #LLMaccountability

Vulnerabilities in MCP (Model Context Protocol) I was hired to audit integrations of an LLM with MCP, for use with data management tools, log collections and automated routines. Here are some problems I found and would like to share so that those of you who want to implement MCP in your products can start thinking about security at the beginning of the development cycle. However, it is worth mentioning that there are still not many efficient solutions, despite some selling LLM Firewalls. I would like to test and validate the effectiveness of this. Anyway, let's get to the points: 1) The lack of HTTPS in API Integrations was a problem I noticed a lot. The LLM and the integrated MCP APIs that were integrated with the tools or executed commands and received the response to the commands allowed me to view the requests and responses. I used Wireshark to validate. 2) Inadequate Permission Management, allowing me to access data from other clients without any tenant isolation, all via Prompt Injection and Burp Suite to analyze requests and perform basic manipulations. 3) Abuse of Automations and Unrestricted Resource Consumption, allowing me to trigger multiple parallel routines, all via a single prompt, or sending different prompts causing the server to trigger routines all at once, without proper thread queue management. I used Burp Suite with Intruder and created a list of prompts and executed at least 50 different prompts with the same context. In addition, there was no control over the request limit in the APIs. 4) SQL Injection via Prompt, basically making requests using human language, for example: “what columns does the users table have?” resulted in queries being executed directly without control and spitting out information, i.e., it seems that the integration opened the database schema (weird). Obviously, the problem is that it built the query in the backend and processed it as an SQL query. I used Burp Suite in this case to analyze the response, etc. 5) Hardcoded Secrets in the MCP Code. API tokens, database credentials, and endpoints were found directly in the MCP integration scripts. Although it is obvious, just because they are in the backend does not mean they must be hardcoded. Unfortunately, I was unable to extract secrets via prompt injection or obtain an RCE. 6) Broad Context allowing Full Control of the application. Although I did not obtain the application secrets, providing broad context to the LLM gave it full control over the integrated systems, executing tasks that should be exclusive to the admin, since the configured keys had excessive permissions that allowed the execution of numerous functions. In short, these are flaws that a trained developer with knowledge of application security could resolve, but many who start integrating solutions with AI do not worry about Shift-Left. #mcp #AI #redteam #cybersecurity #AISecurity #mcpsecurity #pentest #llmpentest

🔐 Just dropped a comprehensive 𝑨𝑰 𝒔𝒆𝒄𝒖𝒓𝒊𝒕𝒚 𝒄𝒉𝒆𝒂𝒕𝒔𝒉𝒆𝒆𝒕! After diving deep into the world of LLM security with customers (and making plenty of mistakes along the way 😅), I've created the resource I wish I had when starting out. 🔖 My latest blog breaks down the 𝐎𝐖𝐀𝐒𝐏 𝐓𝐨𝐩 10 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐋𝐋𝐌𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐆𝐞𝐧𝐀𝐈 in plain English - mapping exactly WHERE in your application architecture each security measure needs to be implemented. 📍 Whether you're building your first AI app or hardening existing systems, this visual guide shows you the exact weak points attackers are targeting right now. 👉 Check out the full breakdown at https://lnkd.in/dpCi4Ws6 and let me know what security challenges you're facing with your AI projects! #AISecurity #OWASP #MachineLearning #CyberSecurity #GenAI #LLMSecurity

Product managers & designers working with AI face a unique challenge: designing a delightful product experience that cannot fully be predicted. Traditionally, product development followed a linear path. A PM defines the problem, a designer draws the solution, and the software teams code the product. The outcome was largely predictable, and the user experience was consistent. However, with AI, the rules have changed. Non-deterministic ML models introduce uncertainty & chaotic behavior. The same question asked four times produces different outputs. Asking the same question in different ways - even just an extra space in the question - elicits different results. How does one design a product experience in the fog of AI? The answer lies in embracing the unpredictable nature of AI and adapting your design approach. Here are a few strategies to consider: 1. Fast feedback loops : Great machine learning products elicit user feedback passively. Just click on the first result of a Google search and come back to the second one. That’s a great signal for Google to know that the first result is not optimal - without tying a word. 2. Evaluation : before products launch, it’s critical to run the machine learning systems through a battery of tests to understand in the most likely use cases, how the LLM will respond. 3. Over-measurement : It’s unclear what will matter in product experiences today, so measuring as much as possible in the user experience, whether it’s session times, conversation topic analysis, sentiment scores, or other numbers. 4. Couple with deterministic systems : Some startups are using large language models to suggest ideas that are evaluated with deterministic or classic machine learning systems. This design pattern can quash some of the chaotic and non-deterministic nature of LLMs. 5. Smaller models : smaller models that are tuned or optimized for use cases will produce narrower output, controlling the experience. The goal is not to eliminate unpredictability altogether but to design a product that can adapt and learn alongside its users. Just as much as the technology has changed products, our design processes must evolve as well.