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AI & Machine Learning · Foundational

System Prompt

Instructions supplied separately from user messages that set a model's role, rules, tone and constraints for a conversation.

Definition

System prompts establish persistent behavior such as persona, scope, safety rules and output format. They carry more weight than ordinary user turns but are not a security boundary, since prompt injection can sometimes override them and they can leak.

Example

You are a support assistant for Acme billing. Answer only billing questions and cite the policy section.

Exam tip

Never put secrets in a system prompt; assume it can be extracted.

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