Learning to Watermark: A Selective Watermarking Framework for Large Language Models via Multi-Objective Optimization

Fuente: arXiv
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Hauptverfasser: Wang, Chenrui, Shu, Junyi, Chiu, Billy, Li, Yu, Alharbi, Saleh, Zhang, Min, Li, Jing
Format: Preprint
Veröffentlicht: 2025
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author Wang, Chenrui
Shu, Junyi
Chiu, Billy
Li, Yu
Alharbi, Saleh
Zhang, Min
Li, Jing
author_facet Wang, Chenrui
Shu, Junyi
Chiu, Billy
Li, Yu
Alharbi, Saleh
Zhang, Min
Li, Jing
contents The rapid development of LLMs has raised concerns about their potential misuse, leading to various watermarking schemes that typically offer high detectability. However, existing watermarking techniques often face trade-off between watermark detectability and generated text quality. In this paper, we introduce Learning to Watermark (LTW), a novel selective watermarking framework that leverages multi-objective optimization to effectively balance these competing goals. LTW features a lightweight network that adaptively decides when to apply the watermark by analyzing sentence embeddings, token entropy, and current watermarking ratio. Training of the network involves two specifically constructed loss functions that guide the model toward Pareto-optimal solutions, thereby harmonizing watermark detectability and text quality. By integrating LTW with two baseline watermarking methods, our experimental evaluations demonstrate that LTW significantly enhances text quality without compromising detectability. Our selective watermarking approach offers a new perspective for designing watermarks for LLMs and a way to preserve high text quality for watermarks. The code is publicly available at: https://github.com/fattyray/learning-to-watermark
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2510_15976
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Learning to Watermark: A Selective Watermarking Framework for Large Language Models via Multi-Objective Optimization
Wang, Chenrui
Shu, Junyi
Chiu, Billy
Li, Yu
Alharbi, Saleh
Zhang, Min
Li, Jing
Cryptography and Security
Artificial Intelligence
The rapid development of LLMs has raised concerns about their potential misuse, leading to various watermarking schemes that typically offer high detectability. However, existing watermarking techniques often face trade-off between watermark detectability and generated text quality. In this paper, we introduce Learning to Watermark (LTW), a novel selective watermarking framework that leverages multi-objective optimization to effectively balance these competing goals. LTW features a lightweight network that adaptively decides when to apply the watermark by analyzing sentence embeddings, token entropy, and current watermarking ratio. Training of the network involves two specifically constructed loss functions that guide the model toward Pareto-optimal solutions, thereby harmonizing watermark detectability and text quality. By integrating LTW with two baseline watermarking methods, our experimental evaluations demonstrate that LTW significantly enhances text quality without compromising detectability. Our selective watermarking approach offers a new perspective for designing watermarks for LLMs and a way to preserve high text quality for watermarks. The code is publicly available at: https://github.com/fattyray/learning-to-watermark
title Learning to Watermark: A Selective Watermarking Framework for Large Language Models via Multi-Objective Optimization
topic Cryptography and Security
Artificial Intelligence
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2510.15976