Memorization in Language Models

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Overview

Researchers study when models reproduce training text or personal data, retain factual knowledge, and generalize beyond examples—questions that matter for privacy, benchmark validity, and reliable use. Common approaches include canary and text-extraction attacks, membership inference, matched training and non-training comparisons, and mechanistic analysis of activations and training dynamics; evaluations include privacy audits and unlearning benchmarks such as TOFU and MUSE. Mitigations range from data filtering and training-objective changes to fine-tuning, unlearning, and targeted edits to model activations or parameters, while agent-memory benchmarks test long-horizon recall. A central tension is that storing information does not guarantee it will be revealed, and reducing leakage must preserve useful recall and generalization.

Latest papers

CardsList

117 papers11 papers in the last four weeks, down 27% on the four weeks before. 0.1% of all new papers.

  1. Learning the Cue or Learning the Word? Analyzing Generalization in Metaphor Detection for Verbs

    Apr 15, 2026Sinan Kurtyigit, Sabine Schulte im Walde, Alexander FraserFigurative Language UnderstandingMemorization in Language Models

    School of Computation, Information and Technology, Technical University of Munich · Institute for Natural Language Processing, University of Stuttgart

  2. Cram Less to Fit More: Training Data Pruning Improves Memorization of Facts

    Apr 9, 2026Jiayuan Ye, Vitaly Feldman, Kunal TalwarMemorization in Language ModelsFactual Knowledge in Language Models

    National University of Singapore · Apple

  3. ImplicitMemBench: Measuring Unconscious Behavioral Adaptation in Large Language Models

    Apr 9, 2026Chonghan Qin, Xiachong Feng, Weitao Ma +2Memorization in Language ModelsMemory Agent Benchmarks

    The University of Hong Kong · Harbin Institute of Technology

  4. Memory Dial: A Training Framework for Controllable Memorization in Language Models

    Apr 6, 2026Xiangbo Zhang, Ali EmamiMemorization in Language Models

    Georgia Institute of Technology · Emory University

  5. Learning the Signature of Memorization in Autoregressive Language Models

    Apr 3, 2026David Ilić, Kostadin Cvejoski, David Stanojević +1Membership Inference AttacksPrivacy Leakage in Language Models

    JetBrains Research

  6. Autolearn: Learn by Surprise, Commit by Proof

    Apr 2, 2026Kang-Sin ChoiOnline Language Model AdaptationKnowledge Augmentation for Language Models

    Ewha Womans University

  7. G-Drift MIA: Membership Inference via Gradient-Induced Feature Drift in LLMs

    Apr 1, 2026Ravi Ranjan, Utkarsh Grover, Xiaomin Lin +1Membership Inference AttacksPrivacy Leakage in Language Models

    Florida International University, Miami, USA · University of South Florida, Tampa, USA

  8. Estimating near-verbatim extraction risk in language models with decoding-constrained beam search

    Mar 26, 2026A. Feder Cooper, Mark A. Lemley, Christopher De Sa +6Memorization in Language ModelsPrivacy Leakage in Language Models

    Stanford & Yale · Stanford · Cornell +1

  9. A Comparative Analysis of LLM Memorization at Statistical and Internal Levels: Cross-Model Commonalities and Model-Specific Signatures

    Mar 23, 2026Bowen Chen, Namgi Han, Yusuke MiyaoMemorization in Language Models

    Department of Computer Science, The University of Tokyo · Research and Development Center for Large Language Models, National Institute of Informatics

  10. Alignment Whack-a-Mole : Finetuning Activates Verbatim Recall of Copyrighted Books in Large Language Models

    Mar 21, 2026Xinyue Liu, Niloofar Mireshghallah, Jane C. Ginsburg +1LLM AlignmentMemorization in Language Models

    Stony Brook University · Carnegie Mellon University · Columbia Law School

  11. Are Large Language Models Truly Smarter Than Humans?

    Mar 17, 2026Eshwar Reddy M, Sourav KarmakarData Contamination in Language ModelsLLM Evaluation

    Applied AI Scientist, Health Vectors · Senior AI Scientist, Intuit India

  12. Learning to Recall with Transformers Beyond Orthogonal Embeddings

    Mar 16, 2026Nuri Mert Vural, Alberto Bietti, Mahdi Soltanolkotabi +1TransformerMemorization in Language Models

    University of Toronto and Vector Institute · Flatiron Institute · University of Southern California +1

  13. Quantifying Memorization and Privacy Risks in Genomic Language Models

    Mar 9, 2026Alexander Nemecek, Wenbiao Li, Xiaoqian Jiang +2Memorization in Language ModelsPrivacy Leakage in Language Models

    Case Western Reserve University Cleveland, Ohio, USA · The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston Houston, Texas, USA · Rutgers University Newark, New Jersey, USA

  14. Characterizing Memorization in Diffusion Language Models: Generalized Extraction and Sampling Effects

    Mar 2, 2026Xiaoyu Luo, Wenrui Yu, Qiongxiu Li +1Training Data ExtractionMemorization in Language Models

    Department of Computer Science, Aalborg University, Copenhagen, Denmark · Department of Electronic Systems, Aalborg University, Copenhagen, Denmark

  15. Extracting Training Dialogue Data from Large Language Model based Task Bots

    Mar 2, 2026Shuo Zhang, Junzhou Zhao, Junji Hou +3Training Data Extraction AttacksPrivacy Leakage in Language Models

    MOE Key Laboratory for Intelligent Networks and Network Security, Xi’an Jiaotong University, P.O. Box 1088, No. 28, Xianning West Road, Xi’an, Shaanxi 710049, China.

  16. Attention Smoothing Is All You Need For Unlearning

    Mar 1, 2026Saleh Zare Zade, Xiangyu Zhou, Sijia Liu +1Machine UnlearningLLM Unlearning

    Department of Computer Science, Wayne State University · Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Michigan State University · Institute for AI and Data Science, Wayne State University

  17. Personal Information Parroting in Language Models

    Feb 24, 2026Nishant Subramani, Kshitish Ghate, Mona DiabMemorization in Language ModelsPrivacy Leakage in Language Models

    ♠Carnegie Mellon University - Language Technologies Institute · University of Washington

  18. Learned but Not Expressed: Capability-Expression Dissociation in Large Language Models

    Feb 24, 2026Toshiyuki ShigemuraMemorization in Language ModelsLanguage Model Generation Evaluation

    Independent Researcher, Japan

  19. A Prior-Aware Metric for Efficiently Distinguishing Memorization from Generalization in Large Language Models

    Feb 21, 2026Trishita Tiwari, Ari Trachtenberg, G. Edward SuhMemorization in Language ModelsLLM Auditing

    Cornell University · Boston University · NVIDIA, Cornell University

  20. Mitigating Memorization Where It Happens

    Feb 9, 2026Xuanqi Zhang, Haoyang Shang, Xiaoxiao LiMemorization in Language ModelsPrivacy Leakage in Language Models

    University of British Columbia · Vector Institute · Independent Researcher

  21. Disentangling generalization and memorization in large language models using chess

    Jan 23, 2026Leonard S. Pleiss, Maximilian Schiffer, Robert K. von WeizsaeckerLanguage Model GeneralizationMemorization in Language Models

    Technical University of Munich

  22. Spurious Rewards Paradox: Mechanistically Understanding How RLVR Activates Memorization Shortcuts in LLMs

    Jan 16, 2026Lecheng Yan, Ruizhe Li, Guanhua Chen +5Reward HackingMemorization in Language Models

    Southern University of Science and Technology · University of Science and Technology of China · University of Aberdeen +5

  23. MemBuilder: Reinforcing LLMs for Long-Term Memory Construction via Attributed Dense Rewards

    Jan 9, 2026Zhiyu Shen, Ziming Wu, Fuming Lai +2Reinforcement LearningMemory-Augmented Language Models

    School of Computer Science and Engineering, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, China · Tencent Inc.

  24. Understanding the Interplay between Memorization and Learning in Large Language Models

    Jul 20, 2025Bishwamittra Ghosh, Soumi Das, Qinyuan Wu +4Memorization in Language ModelsLLM Training

    Max Planck Institute for Software Systems, Germany · Boston University, USA

  25. Evaluating Harmful Memorization in LLM Code Generation

    Mar 4, 2025Lizhe Zhang, Wentao Chen, Li Zhong +3Memorization in Language ModelsLLM Code Generation

    University of California, San Diego†

  26. Continual Memorization of Factoids in Language Models

    Nov 11, 2024Howard Chen, Jiayi Geng, Adithya Bhaskar +2Continual Learning for LLMsMemorization in Language Models

    Princeton Language and Intelligence (PLI), Princeton University

  27. Mitigating Memorization In Language Models

    Oct 3, 2024Mansi Sakarvadia, Aswathy Ajith, Arham Khan +6Memorization in Language ModelsLLM Fine-Tuning

    University of Chicago · Argonne National Laboratory · Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory +3