LoRAGuard: An Effective Black-box Watermarking Approach for LoRAs

Fuente: arXiv
Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Lv, Peizhuo, Xiahou, Yiran, Li, Congyi, Sun, Mengjie, Zhang, Shengzhi, Chen, Kai, Zhang, Yingjun
Format: Preprint
Published: 2025
Subjects:
Online Access:
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
_version_ 1866916584579137536
author Lv, Peizhuo
Xiahou, Yiran
Li, Congyi
Sun, Mengjie
Zhang, Shengzhi
Chen, Kai
Zhang, Yingjun
author_facet Lv, Peizhuo
Xiahou, Yiran
Li, Congyi
Sun, Mengjie
Zhang, Shengzhi
Chen, Kai
Zhang, Yingjun
contents LoRA (Low-Rank Adaptation) has achieved remarkable success in the parameter-efficient fine-tuning of large models. The trained LoRA matrix can be integrated with the base model through addition or negation operation to improve performance on downstream tasks. However, the unauthorized use of LoRAs to generate harmful content highlights the need for effective mechanisms to trace their usage. A natural solution is to embed watermarks into LoRAs to detect unauthorized misuse. However, existing methods struggle when multiple LoRAs are combined or negation operation is applied, as these can significantly degrade watermark performance. In this paper, we introduce LoRAGuard, a novel black-box watermarking technique for detecting unauthorized misuse of LoRAs. To support both addition and negation operations, we propose the Yin-Yang watermark technique, where the Yin watermark is verified during negation operation and the Yang watermark during addition operation. Additionally, we propose a shadow-model-based watermark training approach that significantly improves effectiveness in scenarios involving multiple integrated LoRAs. Extensive experiments on both language and diffusion models show that LoRAGuard achieves nearly 100% watermark verification success and demonstrates strong effectiveness.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2501_15478
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle LoRAGuard: An Effective Black-box Watermarking Approach for LoRAs
Lv, Peizhuo
Xiahou, Yiran
Li, Congyi
Sun, Mengjie
Zhang, Shengzhi
Chen, Kai
Zhang, Yingjun
Cryptography and Security
Machine Learning
LoRA (Low-Rank Adaptation) has achieved remarkable success in the parameter-efficient fine-tuning of large models. The trained LoRA matrix can be integrated with the base model through addition or negation operation to improve performance on downstream tasks. However, the unauthorized use of LoRAs to generate harmful content highlights the need for effective mechanisms to trace their usage. A natural solution is to embed watermarks into LoRAs to detect unauthorized misuse. However, existing methods struggle when multiple LoRAs are combined or negation operation is applied, as these can significantly degrade watermark performance. In this paper, we introduce LoRAGuard, a novel black-box watermarking technique for detecting unauthorized misuse of LoRAs. To support both addition and negation operations, we propose the Yin-Yang watermark technique, where the Yin watermark is verified during negation operation and the Yang watermark during addition operation. Additionally, we propose a shadow-model-based watermark training approach that significantly improves effectiveness in scenarios involving multiple integrated LoRAs. Extensive experiments on both language and diffusion models show that LoRAGuard achieves nearly 100% watermark verification success and demonstrates strong effectiveness.
title LoRAGuard: An Effective Black-box Watermarking Approach for LoRAs
topic Cryptography and Security
Machine Learning
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2501.15478