🎯 What You’ll Get From This
⏱️ 45 min read · 3 exercises
🔗 Deep Dives Per Category
- Prompt Injection in RAG Systems — LLM01 in production deployments
- Many-Shot Jailbreaking — LLM01 at scale via repetition attacks
- Insecure AI Plugin Architecture — LLM07 exploitation methodology
📋OWASP Top 10 LLM Vulnerabilities 2026 — Assessment Framework
- The 3 Categories That Account for 80% of Findings
- LLM01–LLM04 — Injection, Output, Training, Data Disclosure
- LLM05–LLM08 — Supply Chain, Disclosure, Plugins, Agency
- LLM09–LLM10 — Overreliance and Model Theft
- Bug Bounty Data by OWASP LLM Category
- CVSS Scoring for LLM Vulnerabilities
- Assessment Workflow — Scope to Report
The OWASP LLM Top 10 is the framework I reference in every AI security assessment. It provides the shared vocabulary that gets remediation prioritised by clients who have never heard of prompt injection. Everything on this page maps to the deeper attack methodology articles in the LLM Hacking hub and the broader AI Security series. The Phishing URL Scanner is relevant for LLM05 supply chain attacks that deliver malicious content through URLs processed by AI systems.
The 3 Categories That Account for 80% of Findings
Before the full framework: the distribution of real-world AI security findings is not uniform. In my assessment work and disclosed bug bounty reports, three categories dominate. Understanding why they’re dominant shapes where I spend time on any engagement.
⏱️ 15 minutes · No tools required
The first step before any AI security assessment is the category-to-feature mapping. Every OWASP LLM category should map to at least one testable feature — if it doesn’t, you either don’t have enough scope or the application doesn’t use that attack surface.
– Chat interface that processes user questions
– Access to internal documents (RAG pipeline)
– Ability to send Slack messages and create Jira tickets (tools/plugins)
– Uses GPT-4o as the base model with a custom system prompt
– Deployed in production with 500 employees using it
For each OWASP LLM category, identify:
A) Is this attack surface present in the application? (Y/N)
B) What specific feature enables this attack vector?
C) What is your highest-severity test case?
LLM01 Prompt Injection: Y/N · Feature: ___ · Test case: ___
LLM02 Insecure Output: Y/N · Feature: ___ · Test case: ___
LLM03 Training Data Poison:Y/N · Feature: ___ · Test case: ___
LLM04 Model DoS: Y/N · Feature: ___ · Test case: ___
LLM05 Supply Chain: Y/N · Feature: ___ · Test case: ___
LLM06 Sensitive Disclosure: Y/N · Feature: ___ · Test case: ___
LLM07 Insecure Plugin: Y/N · Feature: ___ · Test case: ___
LLM08 Excessive Agency: Y/N · Feature: ___ · Test case: ___
LLM09 Overreliance: Y/N · Feature: ___ · Test case: ___
LLM10 Model Theft: Y/N · Feature: ___ · Test case: ___
Then: rank the 10 categories by expected finding severity for THIS application.
Which 3 would you test first? Why?
📸 Write your completed mapping. Share in #ai-security.
LLM01–LLM04 — Injection, Output, Training, Data Disclosure
The first four categories cover the model input, output, and data lifecycle. I treat LLM01 and LLM06 (which overlaps with LLM04 in disclosure scope) as the mandatory starting point on every engagement. The disclosed incidents for these categories are the most numerous and the most severe.
LLM05–LLM08 — Supply Chain, Disclosure, Plugins, Agency
LLM05 through LLM08 are the categories I find most underassessed in enterprise AI deployments. The supply chain and plugin categories in particular have expanded significantly as the AI tooling ecosystem has grown — every new integration is a new attack surface that most security teams haven’t evaluated.
LLM09–LLM10 — Overreliance and Model Theft
LLM09 and LLM10 are the categories where technical and organisational security controls overlap most heavily. Overreliance is a governance and UX problem as much as a security problem. Model theft is becoming increasingly important as AI IP value rises and model extraction attacks become more accessible.
⏱️ 20 minutes · Browser only
Real disclosed vulnerabilities are more educational than any theoretical description. Before the next assessment I run, I spend 30 minutes reviewing recent disclosures in the target’s likely OWASP categories. Here’s the research workflow.
Go to: hackerone.com/hacktivity
Search: “prompt injection” OR “llm” OR “ai assistant”
Filter: Resolved, last 12 months, Critical/High
For 3 findings: note the OWASP LLM category, payload, and payout.
Step 2: OWASP LLM v2.0 changes review
Go to: genai.owasp.org
Find: the OWASP LLM Top 10 v2.0 document
What categories changed from v1.1?
What new categories were added or renamed?
Step 3: Real incident research
Search Google for: “prompt injection disclosed 2024 2025”
Find 2 real product vulnerabilities (Bing, Copilot, Gmail AI, Slack AI, etc.)
For each: which OWASP LLM category does it map to?
What was the attack chain?
Step 4: Your target research
Pick an AI product you use (or a bug bounty target with AI features).
Which 3 OWASP LLM categories are most likely to yield findings on it?
What’s your first test case for each?
Document: 3 HackerOne findings + 2 real incidents + your target analysis.
📸 Screenshot your 3 HackerOne AI findings with category mappings. Share in #ai-security.
Bug Bounty Data by OWASP LLM Category
The payout distribution across OWASP LLM categories reflects real-world exploitability and business impact — it’s the market’s answer to which vulnerabilities matter most. My analysis of disclosed AI security bug bounty reports gives a consistent picture across major programs.
CVSS Scoring for LLM Vulnerabilities
CVSS was designed for traditional software vulnerabilities — applying it to LLM vulnerabilities requires some nuance. The vectors I find most commonly misscored on AI security assessments are Scope and User Interaction, both of which have non-obvious answers for injection attacks.
Assessment Workflow — Scope to Report
The assessment workflow I run for LLM security engagements maps to the OWASP framework at every stage. The scope document defines which categories are in-scope, the test plan covers each in-scope category, and the report maps every finding to its OWASP LLM code.
⏱️ 15 minutes · No tools required
The scope document defines what you test and what you skip. Getting this right before the engagement prevents scope disputes and ensures you focus time where findings are most likely. Build one for this application.
Features:
– Answers account balance questions (reads account data via API)
– Processes natural language for transaction searches
– Escalates to human agent (sends internal Slack message)
– Trained on bank FAQ and product documentation
– Users are authenticated (bank login required)
– No external URLs or documents processed (no RAG from external sources)
BUILD YOUR SCOPE DOCUMENT:
1. In-scope categories (justify each):
Which 7 of the 10 OWASP LLM categories are testable here?
Which 3 are out of scope and why?
2. Testing priorities:
Rank your 7 in-scope categories by expected severity.
Which single test case would you run first and why?
3. Risk statement:
In plain English, write the sentence that explains to a CISO
why this assessment is needed. Maximum 2 sentences.
No technical jargon — business impact only.
4. Out-of-scope clarification:
LLM03 (Training Data Poisoning) — is it in scope here?
Justify your answer with a yes or no and one sentence.
5. Escalation rule:
If you find evidence that account data from other customers
is accessible via LLM01 injection — what do you do?
(Note: this is a Critical finding with real financial impact)
📸 Write your completed scope document. Share in #ai-security.
📋 OWASP LLM Top 10 — Quick Reference 2026
OWASP LLM Top 10 — Assessment Framework Ready
The 10 categories, real disclosed incidents per category, bug bounty payout data, CVSS scoring guidance, and the assessment workflow from scope to report. The next article in the AI security series is AI Deepfake Penetration Testing 2026 — applying these same framework principles to the synthetic media attack surface.
🧠 Quick Check
❓ Frequently Asked Questions — OWASP LLM Top 10 2026
What is the OWASP LLM Top 10 and when was it last updated?
What is the difference between LLM01 direct and indirect prompt injection?
Which OWASP LLM categories are most likely to produce bug bounty findings?
How does LLM08 Excessive Agency differ from LLM07 Insecure Plugin Design?
Is the OWASP LLM Top 10 the same as the standard OWASP Top 10?
Does CVSS work well for scoring LLM vulnerabilities?
Many-Shot Jailbreaking 2026
📚 Further Reading
- Prompt Injection in RAG Systems 2026 — LLM01 in production RAG deployments. The indirect injection methodology in detail, covering knowledge base poisoning, cross-session exfiltration, and the defences that work at the pipeline level.
- Insecure AI Plugin Architecture 2026 — LLM07 exploitation methodology. Cross-plugin privilege escalation, OAuth scope analysis, and the confirmation gate controls that limit LLM08 blast radius.
- LLM Hacking Hub — The complete AI security series index. Every article maps to one or more OWASP LLM categories — the hub links to the deep-dive article for each attack class covered in this framework.
- OWASP Top 10 for LLM Applications — Official — The primary source. The v2.0 document includes expanded coverage for agentic AI, supply chain risks, and updated attack examples. Required reading before any LLM security assessment.
- MITRE ATLAS — Adversarial Threat Landscape for AI Systems — The AI complement to MITRE ATT&CK. Maps adversarial machine learning and AI attack techniques with documented real-world case studies. Cross-reference ATLAS techniques with OWASP LLM categories for complete coverage.


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