Inducing Personality in LLM-Based Honeypot Agents: Measuring the Effect on Human-Like Agenda Generation

This paper presents SANDMAN, an architecture for cyber deception that leverages Language Agents to emulate convincing human simulacra. Our 'Deceptive Agents' serve as advanced cyber decoys, designed for high-fidelity engagement with attackers by extending the observation period of attack behaviours. Through experimentation, measurement, and analysis, we demonstrate how a prompt schema based on the five-factor model of personality systematically induces distinct 'personalities' in Large Language Models. Our results highlight the feasibility of persona-driven Language Agents for generating diverse, realistic behaviours, ultimately improving cyber deception strategies.

@article{newsham2025_2503.19752,
  title={ Inducing Personality in LLM-Based Honeypot Agents: Measuring the Effect on Human-Like Agenda Generation },
  author={ Lewis Newsham and Ryan Hyland and Daniel Prince },
  journal={arXiv preprint arXiv:2503.19752},
  year={ 2025 }
}