arxivcs.CRcs.AI2026-07-15
Protective Capacity Hallucination: When Large Language Models Claim Nonexistent Capabilities
Eunna Lee, Jungpyo Nam, Sunjun Hwang
When cast as the protector of a vulnerable user yet given no explicit capability boundary, a large language model (LLM) may respond not by acknowledging its limits but by claiming to have taken -- or to be taking -- a real-world protective action it cannot perform, such as contac…