English

Topology Matters: Measuring Memory Leakage in Multi-Agent LLMs

Cryptography and Security 2026-01-13 v3 Artificial Intelligence Computation and Language

Abstract

Graph topology is a fundamental determinant of memory leakage in multi-agent LLM systems, yet its effects remain poorly quantified. We introduce MAMA (Multi-Agent Memory Attack), a framework that measures how network structure shapes leakage. MAMA operates on synthetic documents containing labeled Personally Identifiable Information (PII) entities, from which we generate sanitized task instructions. We execute a two-phase protocol: Engram (seeding private information into a target agent's memory) and Resonance (multi-round interaction where an attacker attempts extraction). Over 10 rounds, we measure leakage as exact-match recovery of ground-truth PII from attacker outputs. We evaluate six canonical topologies (complete, ring, chain, tree, star, star-ring) across n{4,5,6}n\in\{4,5,6\}, attacker-target placements, and base models. Results are consistent: denser connectivity, shorter attacker-target distance, and higher target centrality increase leakage; most leakage occurs in early rounds and then plateaus; model choice shifts absolute rates but preserves topology ordering; spatiotemporal/location attributes leak more readily than identity credentials or regulated identifiers. We distill practical guidance for system design: favor sparse or hierarchical connectivity, maximize attacker-target separation, and restrict hub/shortcut pathways via topology-aware access control.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2512.04668,
  title  = {Topology Matters: Measuring Memory Leakage in Multi-Agent LLMs},
  author = {Jinbo Liu and Defu Cao and Yifei Wei and Tianyao Su and Yuan Liang and Yushun Dong and Yan Liu and Yue Zhao and Xiyang Hu},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2512.04668},
  year   = {2026}
}
R2 v1 2026-07-01T08:09:15.130Z