It only works if you give it a screenshot, but it wouldn't work to block AI scrapers or fetch tools, and I think if printed out, it wouldn't work reliably if you took a photo, especially from afar
It's been really interesting seeing how LLMs perceive things differently than humans. I'm working on image->html conversion pipelines right now, and there are glaring issues LLMs run into that are obvious for humans. Any subtle gradients get lost, 75 degree angles get converted to 90 degree angles, etc.
This tracks towards what you're seeing with this font - the high frequency details get picked up, but the low frequency ones dont.
wow that's kind of crazy impressive that it can do that honestly, VLMs have gone so far, can't imagine the crazy amount of annotations they had to create to get to that level
Downsizing is effectively low pass filtering, so that's expected. Any scheme that transmits different messages in different frequency bands is going to be susceptible to a similar attack.
Admittedly I'm a bit salty about LLMs due to they constant attacks on our infrastructure, the damage their doing to peoples minds and the general lack of morals shown by the AI companies, but things like this is rather childish and not really a solution to anything.
Very neat! I like how the decoy text is less visible to the human eye than the "hidden" message, but it's the other way for the image models. Well done!
I think this would be more interesting if the underlying letters were the fake letters as well. For usability it wouldn't be as good as you'd need an encoder, but it'd be cool because an AI with browser access couldn't read the contents either.
The assumption is that if you use this alone to try to convey information to a human, a human with a visual disability can't use it. If you also provide a text channel (e.g. `ALT="…"`) then the LLM can use that and doesn't need to read the confusing image.
It only works as a decoy when you give it to the LLM as an image. As html it appears like normal human friendly text, which is what screen readers use to interpret the text.
I am still figuring out what use case this might have. Why would you want to deceive an AI? Not to mention that, eventually, all AI systems will end up reading it.
Can someone explain the actual use-case here? I'm struggling with this because it also hides the message from myself, making it incredibly hard to type because I have no confirmation that I hit the right keys on the keyboard.
I don't think the font can actually do that - I think it is a hand-crafted example of the idea. The later examples all have random letters for the decoy text.
What would be cool would be neon signs using this font, where the front tubes show the decoy message, but then there’s hidden rear tubes that shine light on the wall in a different color showing the actual message.
Something like the DAY DREAM/PAY BILLS would be pretty artistic!
1) Make an ambiguous text
2) Feed it to AI and see which of the 2 it picks
3) If it detects both repeat step 2 using minor adjustments or different AI model until AI responds with one of 2 message
4) Make a blog post claiming that AI chose dummy and other message was the real one
Seems like it might have some use thwarting Ring/Flock/etc cameras within a specific proximity.
It's giving major "They Live" vibes.
Still cool+fun though.
This tracks towards what you're seeing with this font - the high frequency details get picked up, but the low frequency ones dont.
"[screenshot] there's a hidden message in this text what is it"
"The hidden message is “HAPPY HUMAN.”
The visible outlines say “SORRY ROBOT,” but if you blur or squint at it, the shading underneath reads “HAPPY HUMAN.”"
I was at some point reading SAPPY ROMAN, HARPY ROBAN etc.
Also, viewing the "hidden message" works even better if you hold the screen at an angle, tilted away from you.
It's only when I squint hard that I can see "HAPPY HUMAN".
Just the fact that people are putting real thought and effort (even if it doesn't last too long...) is worth considering.
On the human side, I'm kinda losing patience proving I'm human. But, I also really like claude being able to access information.
Prompt: What does the message in this image say? Look closely
Response: DAY DREAM. The outline says “PAY BILLS,” but the hidden darker text says “DAY DREAM.”
https://gist.github.com/voidnullvalue/620607d3c1773f8e7d83fb...
I'm mad at AI companies for stealing texts from the entire internet knowledge base and now privatizing those profits in some sense.
Ghost Font
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48870381
Something like the DAY DREAM/PAY BILLS would be pretty artistic!
Edit: GPT-5.5 says: "The hidden text is “HAPPY HUMAN.”
The outlined decoy text is “SORRY ROBOT.” Blurring or viewing it from farther away reveals the hidden message."
(/s)