mlsanityData to 7 Oct 2026

When Tool Outputs Become Commands: Separating Action Induction from Runtime Authorization in Tool-Augmented LLM Agents

arXiv 2608.27146 ↗First posted 27 Aug 2026cs.AI cs.SEcited by 0

On the map: LLM agents and tool use → Agent threats, guardrails and governance

Abstract (arXiv)

Tool-augmented LLM agents must rely on untrusted runtime Observations to complete open-ended tasks; however, when tool outputs no longer merely provide data but begin to specify concrete actions, they effectively become ``commands'' that can drive real-world side effects beyond user intent. We argue that this risk arises from conflating action induction with execution authorization. To address this distinction, we propose SARA, which treats action induction and execution authorization as distinct runtime roles and separates action provenance from execution authority. On the Observation side, a context-isolated Action Probe exposes action-inducing semantics and persistently records action-origin provenance across steps as a review signal; on the execution side, actual tool calls are authorized only against the user objective and audited evidence from authorized successful executions, while satisfying goal, execution-chain, and argument-level support. To preserve this separation across multi-step execution, SARA applies No-History-Promotion to prevent historical recurrence from laundering action origins into execution authority. Across AgentDojo and AgentDyn, SARA limits ASR to no more than (0.63%) across four primary evaluation settings while maintaining competitive task utility, and consistently reduces ASR across additional Agent backbones.

Key facts. No citing papers in the map yet (data through 7 Oct 2026). Placed in Agent threats, guardrails and governance, one of 16 directions in LLM agents and tool use. Builds on 37 of its 51 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 27 Aug 2026.

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37 of 51 references.

Closest ancestors · 13

Same direction, newest first

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  2. 2026Aligning Provenance with Authorization: A Dual-Graph Defense for LLM Agents26 May
  3. 2026The Granularity Mismatch in Agent Security: Argument-Level Provenance Solves Enforcement and Isolates the LLM Reasoning Bottleneck11 May
  4. 2026ClawGuard: A Runtime Security Framework for Tool-Augmented LLM Agents Against Indirect Prompt Injection13 Apr
  5. 2025IPIGuard: A Novel Tool Dependency Graph-Based Defense Against Indirect Prompt Injection in LLM Agents21 Aug
  6. 2025Design Patterns for Securing LLM Agents against Prompt Injections10 Jun
  7. 2025Defeating Prompt Injections by Design24 Mar
  8. 2025RTBAS: Defending LLM Agents Against Prompt Injection and Privacy Leakage13 Feb
  9. 2025MELON: Provable Defense Against Indirect Prompt Injection Attacks in AI Agents7 Feb
  10. 2024The Task Shield: Enforcing Task Alignment to Defend Against Indirect Prompt Injection in LLM Agents21 Dec
  11. 2024Agent Security Bench (ASB): Formalizing and Benchmarking Attacks and Defenses in LLM-based Agents3 Oct
  12. 2024InjecAgent: Benchmarking Indirect Prompt Injections in Tool-Integrated Large Language Model Agents5 Mar
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  1. 2023Identifying the Risks of LM Agents with an LM-Emulated Sandbox25 Sep

Other references · 24

  1. 2024The Llama 3 Herd of Modelscited by 14,192
  2. 2022ReAct: Synergizing Reasoning and Acting in Language Modelscited by 8,355
  3. 2025Qwen3 Technical Reportcited by 8,195
  4. 2024Qwen2.5 Technical Reportcited by 4,713
  5. 2023Toolformer: Language Models Can Teach Themselves to Use Toolscited by 4,072
  6. 2023A Survey on Large Language Model based Autonomous Agentscited by 2,203
  7. 2023WebArena: A Realistic Web Environment for Building Autonomous Agentscited by 1,908
  8. 2023ToolLLM: Facilitating Large Language Models to Master 16000+ Real-world APIscited by 1,880
  9. 2023Not what you've signed up for: Compromising Real-World LLM-Integrated Applications with Indirect Prompt Injectioncited by 1,339
  10. 2024τ-bench: A Benchmark for Tool-Agent-User Interaction in Real-World Domainscited by 1,280
  11. 2022Ignore Previous Prompt: Attack Techniques For Language Modelscited by 760
  12. 2023API-Bank: A Comprehensive Benchmark for Tool-Augmented LLMscited by 574
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  1. 2024The Instruction Hierarchy: Training LLMs to Prioritize Privileged Instructionscited by 441
  2. 2023Formalizing and Benchmarking Prompt Injection Attacks and Defensescited by 328
  3. 2024StruQ: Defending Against Prompt Injection with Structured Queriescited by 325
  4. 2024AgentBoard: An Analytical Evaluation Board of Multi-turn LLM Agentscited by 319
  5. 2024ToolSandbox: A Stateful, Conversational, Interactive Evaluation Benchmark for LLM Tool Use Capabilitiescited by 272
  6. 2024Defending Against Indirect Prompt Injection Attacks With Spotlightingcited by 233
  7. 2024SecAlign: Defending Against Prompt Injection with Preference Optimizationcited by 179
  8. 2024Optimization-based Prompt Injection Attack to LLM-as-a-Judgecited by 123
  9. 2024Is LLM-as-a-Judge Robust? Investigating Universal Adversarial Attacks on Zero-shot LLM Assessmentcited by 117
  10. 2024ToolSword: Unveiling Safety Issues of Large Language Models in Tool Learning Across Three Stagescited by 77
  11. 2026AgentDyn: Are Your Agent Security Defenses Deployable in Real-World Dynamic Environments?cited by 45
  12. 2025How Not to Detect Prompt Injections with an LLMcited by 11

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