Attack Surface

Application layer Research

Security research involving application interfaces and API implementations

6 matching entries out of 273 in this category

Application layer research results

6 entries

Dynamic Security Testing for Third-Party Agent Skills

Published 8/4/2026

Analyzed 8/13/2026

SkillSentry evaluates third-party agent skills by constructing source-grounded decoy environments and comparing matched executions with and without the tested skill. The method requires completed, observable, skill-attributed side effects rather than treating suspicious text, ordinary privileged operations, or unexecuted paths as proven malicious behavior.

SkillSentry: Adaptive Honey Worlds for Dynamic Safety Testing of Agent Skills

Evaluated models: DeepSeek V4-Pro

Source: arXiv

Workspace Agent Runtime Safety Failures Across Risk Carriers

Published 7/29/2026

Analyzed 8/13/2026

AgentS4D measures unsafe actions and state changes across complete workspace-agent executions rather than treating task completion or isolated model responses as safety evidence. Its 328 sandboxed cases introduce risky content through user requests, documents, web resources, tools, third-party skills, and persistent memory, then compare the same cases across four agent harnesses and five model backends.

AgentS4D: Benchmarking Runtime Risks across the Execution Lifecycle of LLM-Based Workspace Agents

Evaluated models: GPT-5.5, Gemini 3.1 Pro, DeepSeek V4-Pro +2 more

Source: arXiv

Incomplete MCP Tool-Call Attack Detection

Published 7/28/2026

Analyzed 8/13/2026

The MTGuard study evaluates unsafe Model Context Protocol tool calls originating from compromised server data, host-side execution changes, and malicious user-controlled resources. Its hybrid monitor combines pre-execution parameter inspection, behavioral observation, and post-execution result verification across browser-automation and financial-analysis agents.

Hybrid Analysis for Secure MCP Tool Use in LLM Agents

Evaluated models: GPT-5.6 Luna, DeepSeek V4 Flash, DeepSeek V4-Pro

Source: arXiv

Long-Context Enterprise Agent Policy Adherence Failures

Published 7/28/2026

Analyzed 8/13/2026

HANDBOOK.md measures whether an agent can apply detailed organizational rules while completing realistic, multi-step enterprise tasks. The vendor-authored benchmark includes 65 resettable MCP-backed workflows, policy documents of 20 to 124 pages, and 824 deterministic rubric checks covering required decisions, prohibited actions, and final environment state.

HANDBOOK.md: A Benchmark for Long-Context Agentic Instruction Following

Evaluated models: Claude Fable 5, GPT-5.6 Sol, Claude Opus 4.8 +16 more

Source: arXiv

MCP Tool-Metadata Prompt Injection in Coding Agents

Published 3/23/2026

Analyzed 7/20/2026

The paper presents a controlled, reproducible evaluation in which untrusted MCP tool descriptions contain hidden instructions that attempt to induce coding agents to access files, invoke other tools, create deceptive links, or execute remote scripts. The authors report that several clients accepted poisoned metadata without adequate validation or parameter visibility; Cursor 1.6.45 was reported unsafe across all four tested vectors. These are paper-reported results from isolated local tests…

Are AI-assisted Development Tools Immune to Prompt Injection?

Evaluated models: Claude Sonnet 4.5, Grok Code Fast 1, Gemini 2.5 Pro +1 more

Source: arXiv

Untrusted Skills and MCP Content Cross Coding-Agent Trust Boundaries

Published 1/24/2026

Analyzed 7/20/2026

The paper describes indirect prompt-injection chains in agentic coding assistants where untrusted repository content, skill definitions, extension context, or MCP tool metadata is interpreted as instructions. Its novel skill-chain analysis identifies a concrete authorization weakness: skills can grant broad tool types such as Read or Bash without restricting permitted file targets, allowing repository-supplied instructions to influence sensitive reads or tool execution. The paper is a…

Prompt Injection Attacks on Agentic Coding Assistants: A Systematic Analysis of Vulnerabilities in Skills, Tools, and Protocol Ecosystems

Evaluated models: Not reported

Source: arXiv

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