aiqbench analysis
This benchmark introduces LIBERO-VIFO to systematically evaluate the capability and safety risks of Vision-Language-Action models regarding unauthorized visual cue following. The study reveals that current VLAs can execute tasks based solely on visual instructions even when language commands are absent or conflicting, highlighting a critical security vulnerability in autonomous systems. By establishing "visual-centric safety" as an evaluation metric, this work provides essential insights for developers aiming to secure next-generation robotic agents against unintended command execution.
LIBERO-VIFO: Benchmarking the Capability and Safety of Visual Cue Following in Vision-Language-Action Models
arXiv:2608.17600v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Visual cues are increasingly adopted to guide robot learning, but whether Vision-Language-Action (VLA) models can reliably follow authorized cues while disregarding unauthorized ones remains unclear. Existing work covers only a narrow range of cue forms and focuses on final task success, providing only a coarse assessment of cue-following capability. Treating all visual cues as authorized also leaves safety risks of unauthorized following unexplored. To address these gaps, we introduce LIBERO-VIFO, a benchmark to evaluate both the capability and safety of visual cue following in VLA models. LIBERO-VIFO defines eight visual cue families spanning diverse forms. A total of four protocols in two parts are defined: Part I tests cue understanding and authorized following, while Part II evaluates unauthorized visual cue following under language-cue conflict and empty language conditions. Evaluating seven VLA models reveals that although visual cue understanding does not reliably translate into execution, current VLAs are able to execute cue-indicated tasks without language instruction, exposing an emerging risk of unauthorized visual cue following. Extended experiments on scene-instantiated cues, safety-critical settings, and real-robot deployment corroborate these findings. LIBERO-VIFO brings both the capability and safety of visual cue following into systematic evaluation, establishing visual-centric safety as a new perspective for the VLA community.
Abstract:Visual cues are increasingly adopted to guide robot learning, but whether Vision-Language-Action (VLA) models can reliably follow authorized cues while disregarding unauthorized ones remains unclear. Existing work covers only a narrow range of cue forms and focuses on final task success, providing only a coarse assessment of cue-following capability. Treating all visual cues as authorized also leaves safety risks of unauthorized following unexplored. To address these gaps, we introduce LIBERO-VIFO, a benchmark to evaluate both the capability and safety of visual cue following in VLA models. LIBERO-VIFO defines eight visual cue families spanning diverse forms. A total of four protocols in two parts are defined: Part I tests cue understanding and authorized following, while Part II evaluates unauthorized visual cue following under language-cue conflict and empty language conditions. Evaluating seven VLA models reveals that although visual cue understanding does not reliably translate into execution, current VLAs are able to execute cue-indicated tasks without language instruction, exposing an emerging risk of unauthorized visual cue following. Extended experiments on scene-instantiated cues, safety-critical settings, and real-robot deployment corroborate these findings. LIBERO-VIFO brings both the capability and safety of visual cue following into systematic evaluation, establishing visual-centric safety as a new perspective for the VLA community.
Robotics (cs.RO)
arXiv:2608.17600 [cs.RO]
(or arXiv:2608.17600v1 [cs.RO] for this version)
https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2608.17600 Focus to learn more arXiv-issued DOI via DataCite (pending registration)
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Full text under the publisher's open licence · 295 words
