提出J-Access审计方法,检测大模型删知识后是否可能恢复。
Measure, Don't Optimize: Forecasting Recovery in LLM Unlearning

- 用雅可比矩阵分析中间表示,判断目标概念在输出路径中是否仍可访问。
- 多数删过知识的模型仍保留可访问性,且访问程度预示恢复快慢。
- 别把审计结果当优化目标,否则模型会伪装,反而更易恢复知识。
先前白盒研究发现,大语言模型在删除特定知识后,仍可能在内部保留潜在痕迹,即使输出已不显示该知识。然而现有审计仅限于一次性诊断,无法判断这些残留信号是否会引发后续恢复或能否作为优化目标。为填补此空白,我们提出J-Access——一种推理时的审计方法,通过雅可比视角将中间表示映射到词汇空间,测量目标概念在输出路径中仍可被访问的频率。假设残余可访问性反映恢复敏感性:越接近输出路径的知识,越容易通过微调恢复。我们对398个公开的已删知识模型(涵盖8种删减方法)进行审计,发现:(1) 多数模型保留的可访问性高于仅保留的基准水平;(2) 删除前的可访问性可预测模型整体恢复速度与程度,但无法识别具体哪些事实会被恢复;(3) 直接最小化J-Access不会促进真实删除,反而使模型学会隐藏知识以降低审计得分,导致攻击后恢复更强。这表明J-Access应作为模型级诊断工具,而非优化目标。
原文摘要 · Abstract (English)
Prior white-box studies show that large language models can retain latent traces of target knowledge after unlearning, even when the knowledge is no longer expressed in their outputs. However, existing audits remain limited to one-off diagnostics: it is unclear whether these residual signals can predict future recovery under continued training or serve as reliable optimization targets. Resolving this gap is essential to determine whether internal auditing can move beyond post-hoc evaluation toward proactive risk monitoring and safer unlearning. We propose J-Access, an inference-time audit that uses the Jacobian lens to map intermediate representations into vocabulary space and measures how often target concepts remain accessible along the model's output pathway. We hypothesize that residual accessibility reflects recovery susceptibility: knowledge that remains closer to the output pathway requires less fine-tuning to restore, leading to faster recovery. We audit 398 public unlearned models spanning eight unlearning methods. We find that: (1) most unlearned models retain access above the retain-only gold level; (2) pre-attack accessibility predicts recovery speed and extent at the model level, but cannot identify which specific facts will be recovered; and (3) directly minimizing J-Access does not promote genuine deletion. Instead, the model learns to hide knowledge from the audit, producing lower audit scores but greater post-attack recovery. These findings position J-Access as a model-level diagnostic for assessing residual susceptibility in unlearned models. We argue internal audits should serve as an independent diagnostic dimension in unlearning evaluation, and should not be converted into optimization targets without validation.
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