| Internet-Draft | Agent Mandates | November 2026 |
| Hulea | Expires 5 May 2027 | [Page] |
This document defines how a relying party in one administrative domain validates the mandate under which a software agent, including an AI agent, acts for a principal in another domain. Its distinctive element is evidence of the delegator's authority: a statement from an authority source about which permissions the person or entity granting the mandate may delegate to agents, kept separate from the statement that the mandate was granted. The document specifies the mandate format with precisely defined limit semantics, a deterministic validation procedure driven by an explicit validation profile and kept separate from the relying party's authorization decision, the attribution of every validated claim to the issuer and role that asserted it, rules for enforcing the mandate after token exchange, and the boundary between this protocol and a trust framework. It reuses JSON Web Tokens, OAuth 2.0 Token Exchange, Rich Authorization Requests, WIMSE workload credentials and HTTP Message Signatures, Token Status Lists, and Entity Attestation Tokens.¶
This Internet-Draft is submitted in full conformance with the provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79.¶
Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). Note that other groups may also distribute working documents as Internet-Drafts. The list of current Internet-Drafts is at https://datatracker.ietf.org/drafts/current/.¶
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This Internet-Draft will expire on 5 May 2027.¶
Copyright (c) 2026 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the document authors. All rights reserved.¶
This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal Provisions Relating to IETF Documents (https://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of publication of this document. Please review these documents carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with respect to this document. Code Components extracted from this document must include Revised BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as described in the Revised BSD License.¶
Software agents increasingly act on behalf of people and organizations in systems those people and organizations do not operate. A treasury agent run by a company initiates a payment at the company's bank. An agent run by a broker submits an instruction to a custodian. In each case the relying party has to decide whether to accept an action from an agent configured, authorized, and operated in another administrative domain.¶
Most building blocks exist. OAuth 2.0 Token Exchange [RFC8693] exchanges security tokens, including across security domains, and distinguishes the subject on whose behalf a request is made from the actor that makes it. Rich Authorization Requests [RFC9396] express fine-grained permissions. WIMSE workload credentials [I-D.ietf-wimse-workload-creds] bind a workload identifier to a key. Work on agents is advancing quickly: [I-D.ietf-wimse-aims] describes how existing standards apply to agent authentication and authorization, [I-D.asor-wimse-agent-delegation-chain] and [I-D.hamr-oauth-agent-delegation] define attenuated delegation chains, and [I-D.reece-wimse-cross-org-delegation] and [I-D.yossif-agent-mandate-problem] state requirements for cross-organization delegation and for verifiable mandates (Appendix C).¶
What is not yet defined is evidence that the party at the root of a mandate was entitled to grant it. A chain that only narrows proves that no hop exceeded its parent. It does not prove that the root was within the delegator's own authority, for example within the powers of a company's legal representative. This document adds that evidence, validates it together with the mandate under explicit rules, and keeps each claim attributed to the issuer that made it.¶
Interoperable mandate semantics. Independent implementations understand and check the same things: the structure of the mandate, the semantics of its limits, the delegation chain, the binding to a key, and revocation status (Section 4, Section 4.5).¶
Validation separate from authorization. Given the same inputs, including the same validation profile, two conforming Validators produce the same Validation Result. The relying party then applies its own policy (Section 9, Section 10.1).¶
Attribution of claims to issuers. The delegator's authority, the grant of the mandate, the operator's statement about the agent instance, and the state of the runtime come from different issuers. A relying party can tell exactly who asserted what (Section 11).¶
A clear boundary with the trust framework. This document defines how evidence is expressed and verified. Which issuers are accepted, what assurance levels mean, and which obligations issuers assume belong to a trust framework (Section 12).¶
This document does not:¶
determine whether an agent's reasoning or output is correct, or whether an action reflects the principal's present intent;¶
define a trust framework, assurance levels, or the legal effect of a mandate;¶
define how a delegator is shown a mandate or consents to it;¶
replace the relying party's authorization policy.¶
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT", "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "NOT RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in BCP 14 [RFC2119] [RFC8174] when, and only when, they appear in all capitals, as shown here.¶
The natural or legal person on whose behalf an agent acts.¶
The party that grants a root mandate: the principal itself, or a party holding authority to act for the principal.¶
A party that asserts that a delegator holds authority to act for a principal, for example a register of legal representatives.¶
The organization that runs an agent instance and controls its keys.¶
A running workload, identified by a workload identifier [I-D.ietf-wimse-arch], that holds a private key.¶
The entity that signs a root Mandate Assertion on the delegator's instruction. It may be the delegator itself.¶
A signed JWT expressing a mandate (Section 4). A root Mandate Assertion is signed by a Mandate Issuer; a sub-delegated one by the agent instance holding the parent mandate.¶
In a chain of Mandate Assertions linked by parent, the root is the
assertion without parent, signed by a Mandate Issuer; the leaf is
the assertion held by the presenting agent instance and sent as
subject_token. A chain of one mandate has the same assertion as
root and leaf.¶
A signed JWT or SD-JWT [RFC9901] issued by an Authority Source (Section 5).¶
The artifacts an agent instance presents to a relying party (Section 7).¶
The entity in another administrative domain that receives the action request. In this document the RP's authorization server hosts the Validator and issues access tokens.¶
The RP component that executes the Mandate Validation Procedure.¶
A versioned document that fixes every rule the Validator applies beyond this specification (Section 8).¶
The set of rules, identified by a URI, under which issuers are accepted and evidence is interpreted (Section 12).¶
A condition that the Validator cannot evaluate from its inputs and that the RP has to discharge before it allows the action.¶
A named cumulative limit shared by all actions under the same root mandate that refer to it (Section 9.5).¶
+-----------+ Authority +-----------+
| Authority |------------->| Delegator |
| Source | Assertion +-----+-----+
+-----------+ | instructs
v
+-----------+
| Mandate |
| Issuer |
+-----+-----+
+-----------+ Workload | Mandate Assertion
| Operator |------------->+-----v-----+
+-----------+ Identity | Agent |
Token | Instance |
+-----------+ Attestation | |
| Verifier |------------->| |
+-----------+ Result +-----+-----+
| Mandate Presentation,
| signed HTTP request
v
+-----------+ Validation +-----------+
| Validator |------------->| RP |
+-----------+ Result | Policy |
+-----------+
An Authority Source issues an Authority Assertion stating that the delegator may act for the principal within stated powers.¶
A Mandate Issuer, on the delegator's instruction, issues a root Mandate Assertion bound to the agent instance's key and referencing the Authority Assertion.¶
The operator issues the agent instance a Workload Identity Token (WIT) [I-D.ietf-wimse-workload-creds] for the same key. A RATS Verifier [RFC9334] MAY issue an attestation result.¶
The agent instance sends a token exchange request carrying the evidence and the requested action, signed with its key (Section 7).¶
The Validator executes the Mandate Validation Procedure under a Validation Profile. The RP applies its policy, discharges Obligations, and issues a single-use access token (Section 10).¶
An agent instance MAY delegate a narrower mandate to another agent instance (Section 4.8).¶
A Mandate Assertion is a JWT [RFC7519] signed as a JWS [RFC7515].
The JOSE header typ value MUST be mandate+jwt. Implementations MUST
follow [RFC8725]. The algorithm MUST be one permitted by the
Validation Profile.¶
REQUIRED. Identifier of the Mandate Issuer, or, for a sub-delegated mandate, the workload identifier of the delegating agent instance.¶
REQUIRED. Workload identifier of the agent instance that holds the mandate.¶
REQUIRED. Unique identifier of the assertion.¶
REQUIRED. Confirmation claim [RFC7800] containing a jkt member,
the JWK SHA-256 thumbprint [RFC7638] of the holder's public key.¶
REQUIRED. A Party Identifier (Section 4.2) for the principal.¶
REQUIRED. A Party Identifier for the delegator. In a sub-delegated mandate, a Party Identifier for the delegating agent instance.¶
In a root mandate, REQUIRED unless delegator equals principal,
in which case it MUST NOT appear; an array of Artifact References
(Section 4.3) to Authority Assertions. The references are
alternatives: one supporting assertion establishes authority
(Section 9.4). MUST NOT appear in a sub-delegated
mandate.¶
REQUIRED. A non-empty array of Permission objects (Section 4.4).¶
REQUIRED in a sub-delegated mandate; MUST NOT appear in a root mandate. An Artifact Reference to the parent Mandate Assertion.¶
OPTIONAL. Non-negative integer: the number of further sub-delegations permitted below this mandate. Default 0.¶
OPTIONAL. Array of RP identifiers to which the mandate may be presented.¶
OPTIONAL. Status reference as defined in [I-D.ietf-oauth-status-list]. The Validation Profile states when it is required.¶
REQUIRED. URI of the Trust Framework under which the assertion was issued.¶
OPTIONAL. Assurance level asserted by the issuer. Its meaning is defined by the Trust Framework; the Validator reports it and does not interpret it.¶
A Party Identifier is a JSON object with two REQUIRED string members:
id, and scheme, a URI naming the identifier scheme. Two Party
Identifiers are equal if and only if both members are equal as
sequences of Unicode code points.¶
An Artifact Reference is a JSON object with a REQUIRED member dig,
the base64url-encoded SHA-256 digest of the ASCII bytes of the
referenced artifact's compact JWS serialization. For an SD-JWT, the
digest is computed over the issuer-signed JWT only. The OPTIONAL
members iss and jti are hints for locating the artifact; they play
no part in matching. A reference matches an artifact if and only if
the digests are equal.¶
A Permission object has the structure of an authorization details
object [RFC9396]: a REQUIRED type member and type-specific members,
including the common members locations, actions, datatypes,
identifier, and privileges. It MAY also contain constraints, an
array of Constraint objects (Section 4.5).¶
[RFC9396] does not define a general way to compare two authorization details objects, because the meaning of their members depends on the API. This document therefore applies its matching and attenuation rules only to types listed in the Validation Profile, each with a Type Profile (Section 8.1). A request of an unlisted type does not match.¶
Let the constrained members of P be the first reference tokens of the
ptr values of P's constraints. A requested authorization detail R
matches a Permission P at validation time T if and only if:¶
R.type equals P.type, and the type is listed in the Validation Profile.¶
For each of locations, actions, datatypes, and privileges
present in P, R contains the member and every element of R's array
is identical (Section 4.6) to an element of P's array.¶
Every other member of P except constraints is present in R with an
identical value.¶
Every top-level member of R is admitted by P: type, one of
locations, actions, datatypes, and privileges, a member of P,
a constrained member of P, or an admitted member of the Type Profile
(Section 8.1).¶
Every stateless constraint in P is satisfied by R at time T.¶
For every stateful constraint in P, the pointer resolves in R to a
value the predicate accepts: for sum_max, a string matching
nonneg; for cosign_above, a string matching decimal.¶
A Permission without one of locations, actions, datatypes, and
privileges places no restriction on that dimension. Likewise, an
admitted member of the Type Profile that P neither contains nor
constrains may take any value. Rule 4 prevents a request from carrying
any other member, which the mandate did not anticipate and which could
change the meaning of the action.¶
These rules, and those in Section 4.7, are fixed by this document. A Type Profile chooses which members are admitted; it cannot replace the comparison rules. Identity comparison and a registered set of predicates keep the result the same across implementations.¶
A Constraint object has the members pred (REQUIRED), ptr (a JSON
Pointer [RFC6901] evaluated against the requested authorization
detail; REQUIRED except for window), and value (REQUIRED). The
sum_max predicate also has the REQUIRED members period and
budget.¶
Amounts are decimal strings matching the ABNF below, compared as exact decimal numbers. JSON numbers MUST NOT be used for amounts.¶
decimal = ["-"] nonneg
nonneg = ("0" / (%x31-39 *DIGIT)) ["." 1*DIGIT]
¶
period is an integer number of seconds, at least 1 and at most the
framework's max_period in the Validation Profile (Section 8).
budget is a string.¶
The value of eq is any JSON value; of in, a non-empty array; of
max, min, and cosign_above, a string matching decimal; of
sum_max, a string matching nonneg; and of window, an object with
the integer members nbf and exp, nbf less than exp. A
constraint with a value of another type, a missing REQUIRED member,
or a period that is not an integer of at least 1 makes its artifact
malformed; a period above max_period gives lifetime_exceeded
(Section 9.3).¶
If a pointer does not resolve, or resolves to a value of the wrong type, the constraint is not satisfied.¶
| pred | Kind | Satisfied when |
|---|---|---|
| eq | stateless | resolved value is identical to value
|
| in | stateless | resolved value is identical to an element of value
|
| max | stateless | resolved decimal is less than or equal to value
|
| min | stateless | resolved decimal is greater than or equal to value
|
| window | stateless |
value.nbf <= T < value.exp (no ptr) |
| sum_max | stateful | resolved value matches nonneg; produces an Obligation |
| cosign_above | stateful | produces an Obligation if resolved decimal exceeds value
|
For sum_max, value MUST match nonneg, and a negative resolved
value does not satisfy the constraint. All sum_max constraints with
the same budget in one Permission MUST have the same ptr, so that
an action contributes a single, well-defined amount to each budget; a
Permission that violates this makes its artifact malformed. Several
sum_max constraints may still share a budget and pointer with
different periods, for example a daily and a monthly limit on the same
amount. Refunds, reversals, and other
negative contributions are outside the scope of sum_max and need a
separately defined predicate.¶
A predicate not listed as supported in the Validation Profile makes the
Permission not match. A constraint whose pred is not listed as
supported is checked in step 2 (Section 9.3) only for the presence of pred and
value; its other members and the type of its value are not
checked, and in Section 4.7 no child constraint is at least as
strict as it.¶
Two JSON values are identical if they have the same type and: strings are equal as sequences of Unicode code points; booleans are identical only if both are true or both are false; null is identical to null; arrays have the same length and identical elements in order; objects have the same member names and identical member values. JSON numbers SHOULD NOT be used in Permission members or constraint values; when used, they are identical only if their textual representations are identical.¶
Attenuation is used for sub-delegation (Section 4.8) and for checking a root mandate against the delegator's powers (Section 9.4). A child Permission C is attenuated with respect to a parent Permission P if and only if:¶
C.type equals P.type.¶
For each of locations, actions, datatypes, and privileges
present in P, C contains the member and C's array contains only
elements identical to elements of P's array.¶
Every other member of P except constraints is present in C with
an identical value.¶
Every top-level member of C other than type and constraints is
admitted by P, in the sense of rule 4 of Section 4.4.¶
Every constrained member of C is admitted by P. A constraint in C can therefore only narrow the values of a member that P already admits; it cannot admit a member that P rejects.¶
For every constraint in P, C contains a constraint with the same
ptr that is at least as strict, per Table 2.¶
Together these rules ensure that every request matching C also matches P.¶
| Parent pred | Child constraint is at least as strict when |
|---|---|
| eq |
eq with identical value
|
| in |
in with value a subset, or eq with value an element |
| max |
max with value less than or equal |
| min |
min with value greater than or equal |
| window |
window with nbf not earlier and exp not later |
| sum_max |
sum_max with identical budget, value less than or equal, period greater than or equal |
| cosign_above |
cosign_above with value less than or equal |
The sum_max rule is sound because contributions are non-negative and
the budget is shared (Section 9.5): the sum over the parent's
period is at most the sum over the longer child period, which the
child's constraint keeps at or below a value no greater than the
parent's.¶
A set of child Permissions is attenuated with respect to a set of parent Permissions if every child Permission is attenuated with respect to at least one parent Permission.¶
An agent instance whose mandate has max_depth of at least 1 MAY issue
a sub-delegated Mandate Assertion. The sub-delegated assertion:¶
is signed with the private key whose thumbprint is the parent's
cnf.jkt, and carries the corresponding public key in the jwk
member of its protected JOSE header;¶
has iss equal to the parent's sub;¶
has principal and tf equal to the parent's;¶
has exp not later than the parent's;¶
has max_depth at most the parent's max_depth minus 1;¶
has aud, if the parent has aud, containing only elements of the
parent's aud;¶
has perms attenuated with respect to the parent's perms.¶
The key in the jwk header is not a trust anchor. It is accepted only
because the already verified parent mandate binds its thumbprint.¶
The agent instance presents a WIT [I-D.ietf-wimse-workload-creds]
issued by its operator. Under this specification the WIT MUST contain
iss and iat; [I-D.ietf-wimse-workload-creds] makes iss
optional and does not list iat, which is needed for the
max_validity check of step 3 (Section 9.3).
The WIT sub MUST equal the leaf mandate's sub, and the JWK SHA-256
thumbprint of the WIT's cnf.jwk MUST equal the leaf mandate's
cnf.jkt. The WIT is referenced by digest; it carries no tf, and its
issuer is checked against operator anchors accepted for the
framework context (Section 9).¶
The WIT asserts that the operator runs an agent instance with this identifier and key. It asserts nothing about the model, configuration, or behavior of the instance.¶
An agent instance MAY present an attestation result from a RATS
Verifier [RFC9334], encoded as a JWT-based EAT [RFC9711] with typ
value eat+jwt and the claims iss, iat, exp, eat_profile, and
cnf with a jkt member. The eat_profile value MUST be one accepted
by the Validation Profile, which also fixes the meaning of the result.
The cnf.jkt MUST equal the leaf mandate's cnf.jkt.¶
An attestation result describes the Verifier's appraisal of evidence at the time the evidence was produced, not the state of the instance afterwards [RFC9334]. When the instance obtains model output from a remote service, the result covers the remote model only if the appraised evidence covered it.¶
An agent instance MAY present an Exposure Statement: a JWT with typ
value agent-exposure+jwt, signed by a control component that observes
the instance's session (the observer), not by the agent instance. It
contains:¶
iss, jti, iat, exp, and sub (the agent instance);¶
aud: the identifier of the single RP to which the statement may be
presented;¶
cnf with a jkt member equal to the leaf mandate's cnf.jkt;¶
sid: an identifier, assigned by the observer, of the session it
observed;¶
nonce: the value of the nonce parameter of the HTTP Message
Signature of the request it accompanies (Section 7.2);¶
ad_hash: the base64url-encoded SHA-256 digest of the bytes of the
authorization_details parameter value of that request, as sent;¶
exposure: an array of exposure event types from Section 15.6
that the observer recorded in session sid up to iat, sorted by
code point, without duplicates.¶
The agent instance obtains the statement from the observer for one specific request to one RP, supplying the RP identifier and the signature nonce it will use. The statement is single-use:¶
aud restricts it to one RP, so the same statement cannot be
presented at a second RP;¶
the RP's authorization server consumes it, as described below, only after the Validator has accepted it for this presentation.¶
The authorization server proceeds in this order:¶
It verifies the HTTP Message Signature and runs the Validator.¶
If the outcome is invalid, it rejects the request. No Exposure
Statement is consumed.¶
Otherwise, it takes the deduplicated set of pairs (iss, jti) of
the Exposure Statements listed in the result's evidence, and only
those. In one atomic operation, if any pair in the set is already
recorded, it rejects the request and records none of them;
otherwise it records all of them, each with the statement's
verified exp.¶
It then applies its policy and continues with authorization.¶
A presentation that is invalid, and a statement the Validator
rejected, therefore never change the record. A forged statement that
copies a legitimate iss and jti, or an authentic statement
presented with another key or nonce, cannot consume the legitimate
one. Each record MUST be kept until the recorded exp plus
max_clock_skew, independently of how long signature nonces are
kept. A statement is consumed once recorded, even if the RP's policy
later refuses the action. Consumption is tracked outside the
Validator, which remains a deterministic function of its inputs. The
statement describes the session the observer attributes to that
request. exp minus iat MUST NOT exceed the Validation Profile's
maximum for Exposure Statements. An empty exposure array means that
no registered event was observed, not that the session was free of
manipulation.¶
The observer MAY be run by the operator, but its signing key MUST NOT
be accessible to the agent instance. Each exposure_observer trust
anchor lists the WIT issuers whose sessions it may observe.¶
This document profiles OAuth 2.0 Token Exchange [RFC8693]. The agent instance is the client of the RP's authorization server.¶
The request contains:¶
subject_token: the leaf Mandate Assertion;¶
subject_token_type: urn:ietf:params:oauth:token-type:agent-mandate;¶
actor_token: the agent instance's WIT;¶
actor_token_type: urn:ietf:params:oauth:token-type:jwt;¶
authorization_details: an array containing exactly one
authorization details object [RFC9396], the requested action. This
version authorizes one action per request and per token;¶
mandate_evidence: a JSON array of strings, each the compact
serialization of a parent Mandate Assertion, an Authority Assertion,
an attestation result, or an Exposure Statement. REQUIRED when the
leaf is sub-delegated or references an Authority Assertion.¶
The client MUST sign the request with HTTP Message Signatures
[RFC9421] as profiled for workloads by
[I-D.ietf-wimse-http-signature], using the key confirmed by the WIT.
The signature MUST cover at least @method, @target-uri, the
Content-Digest header field [RFC9530], and the
Workload-Identity-Token header field, and MUST carry the created,
expires, and nonce parameters. The Workload-Identity-Token header
field MUST carry the same WIT as actor_token. expires minus
created MUST NOT exceed the Validation Profile's max_pop_window.¶
Because the request body carries the mandate, the evidence, and the
requested authorization details, and Content-Digest covers the body,
the signature binds the key, the RP endpoint, the mandate, and the
requested action, and its parameters give freshness. The authorization
server MUST reject a nonce it has already accepted within the
signature's validity period. The Workload Proof Token
[I-D.ietf-wimse-wpt] is not used because it does not cover the
request body.¶
The PoP outcome given to the Validator (Section 9.1) is ok if and only
if all of these checks succeed; the verified nonce value is also
given to the Validator.¶
The Validation Profile is a JSON document fixing every rule that influences the Validation Result and is not fixed by this specification. It is identified by a URI and by the base64url-encoded SHA-256 digest of its bytes. It contains at least:¶
iss: the identifier of the entity that issued the profile, usually
the RP;¶
max_clock_skew, max_pop_window, max_token_lifetime, and
max_status_age, in seconds;¶
max_chain_length, the greatest number of Mandate Assertions in a
chain;¶
predicates: the supported constraint predicates;¶
status_values (optional): a mapping from Token Status List values
other than 0x00, 0x01, and 0x02 to valid, revoked, or
suspended;¶
types: the supported authorization details types, each with its
Type Profile included in full (Section 8.1);¶
eat_profiles: the accepted eat_profile values;¶
frameworks: one entry per accepted Trust Framework URI, with:¶
algs: permitted signature algorithms;¶
party_schemes: accepted Party Identifier schemes;¶
self_schemes: the Party Identifier schemes under which a root
whose delegator equals its principal is an accepted basis of
authority (Section 9.4). An empty array admits no
such root;¶
max_validity: an object whose members are typ values and whose
values are the maximum of exp minus iat, in seconds, for
artifacts with that typ. The members are mandate+jwt,
authority+jwt, authority+sd-jwt, wit+jwt, eat+jwt, and
agent-exposure+jwt;¶
max_period: the maximum period of a sum_max constraint, in
seconds;¶
status_required: the typ values of the artifacts that MUST
carry status;¶
authority_frameworks: the Trust Framework URIs whose Authority
Assertions are accepted for mandates under this framework. The
framework's own URI is accepted only if listed.¶
The Validation Profile reflects the Trust Framework rules that a machine can check. It does not contain the RP's authorization policy.¶
A Trust Framework MAY require the profile to be signed by its issuer
or ratified by the framework's operator, with a JWS [RFC7515] with
detached payload over the same bytes. The digest is computed over the
profile's bytes alone, so a signature does not change the Validation
Result. When the profile is signed or ratified, the signature lets an
evaluator in another domain establish who issued or ratified it.
Without a signature, iss is the profile's own statement of its
issuer, and the digest fixes only the content.¶
A Type Profile is part of the Validation Profile document, so the
profile's digest fixes it; it MUST NOT refer to external content that
influences validation. It is the value of the type's member in
types, an object with three members:¶
schema: a JSON Schema for requested authorization details of the
type, included in full;¶
admitted: the admitted members, top-level members a request may
carry without the Permission mentioning them, each of which is
unrestricted unless a Permission contains or constrains it;¶
meaning: an object giving, for each admitted member, its meaning,
so that "unrestricted" has a defined effect.¶
The schema applies to the requested authorization detail; a request
that does not conform gives request_malformed. Permissions are not
validated against it, because they may omit members a request needs. A
Permission member the schema forbids simply cannot be matched, since
matching requires the conforming request to carry it.¶
Schemas MUST use JSON Schema draft 2020-12 [JSON-SCHEMA-CORE]
[JSON-SCHEMA-VALIDATION] and MUST declare it with the $schema
keyword value https://json-schema.org/draft/2020-12/schema. A schema
MAY use only the Core, Applicator, and Validation vocabularies and the
Format-Annotation vocabulary; format is an annotation and never
causes a request to fail validation. $ref MUST resolve within the
same schema. A Validation Profile containing a schema that violates
these rules, or a keyword outside those vocabularies, is unusable: a
Validator MUST refuse to load it and MUST NOT validate under it.¶
The dialect and the vocabularies are fixed because two independent Validators have to reach the same Validation Result, and they are listed so that the dependency on JSON Schema stays bounded. The two JSON Schema documents are therefore normative references although they are not RFCs.¶
The procedure takes exactly these inputs:¶
the Mandate Presentation;¶
the bytes of the authorization_details parameter and its parsed
value;¶
the validation time T;¶
the Validation Profile and its digest;¶
the Trust Anchor Set and its digest;¶
a set of Status List Tokens [I-D.ietf-oauth-status-list];¶
the RP identifier;¶
the PoP outcome and the verified signature nonce (Section 7.2).¶
The Trust Anchor Set is a JSON document, identified like the
Validation Profile by a URI and by the base64url-encoded SHA-256
digest of its bytes, so that the anchors in force at T are fixed. It
contains anchors, an array of objects, each with:¶
role: one of mandate_issuer, authority_source, operator,
verifier, exposure_observer, and status_issuer;¶
iss: a non-empty array of the issuer identifiers the entity uses;¶
keys: a non-empty array of public keys as JWKs;¶
frameworks: the Trust Framework URIs for which the anchor is
accepted;¶
for an exposure_observer anchor, observes: the WIT issuers whose
sessions it may observe; for a status_issuer anchor,
publishes_for: the artifact issuers for which it may publish
status.¶
An artifact verifies under an anchor of a role for a framework if the
anchor has that role, lists the artifact's iss, is accepted for that
framework, and has a key with which the signature verifies. A kid
header is at most a hint for finding the key. If no anchor of the
role satisfies all four conditions, the code is signature_invalid,
unless a key that verifies the signature is found only under an anchor
of another role, in which case it is role_mismatch.¶
Two conforming Validators given identical inputs MUST produce identical Validation Results. A Validator MUST NOT consult any other input and MUST NOT apply local authorization policy. Status List Tokens are fetched before validation.¶
Required evidence is the leaf Mandate Assertion, its ancestors, the
Authority Assertions referenced by the root and presented, and the
WIT. The references in authority are alternatives: only an assertion
that supports the root is needed, and Section 9.4 states
when a problem with another referenced assertion is reported as a
diagnostic instead of an error. An artifact in mandate_evidence that
is neither a mandate in the chain, nor referenced by the root's
authority, nor an attestation result or an Exposure Statement, is
ignored and does not appear in the result. Optional evidence is
attestation
results and Exposure Statements. A problem with required evidence is
an error. A problem with optional evidence, and the reason a
Permission did not match a request, is a diagnostic. Only errors
affect the outcome.¶
The Validator performs every step that can be performed and records every applicable code (Section 15.5); it does not stop at the first failure.¶
Chain and context. Starting from the leaf, follow parent
references through the artifacts in mandate_evidence. A reference
without a matching artifact gives chain_broken on the mandate
carrying the reference. The Validator follows at most
max_chain_length mandates, the leaf included. If the last mandate
followed carries parent, the chain is longer: the Validator
records chain_too_long, does not resolve that reference, records
no chain_broken for it, and no root is reached. If a root is
reached, the framework context is the root's tf; if that URI has
no entry in the Validation Profile's frameworks,
framework_not_accepted on the root. If the root does not parse or
has no tf, the framework context is undetermined and tf in the
result is null; framework_not_accepted is not recorded. If no
root is reached, or the framework context is undetermined or not
accepted, steps 3
to 5 and 7 are skipped, the authority check is not evaluated, and
every optional evidence artifact is listed under rejected with
evidence_rejected. If no root is reached, chain in the result
lists the mandates that were recovered, starting with the highest
recovered ancestor.¶
Structure. Each required artifact parses, has the expected
typ, and contains its REQUIRED claims. Each claim that is present
has the type and structure given for it in this document or in the
specification that defines the artifact. It contains no claim this
document forbids for it: authority in a sub-delegated mandate or
in a root whose delegator equals its principal, and parent in
a root. Every Constraint has the members and value types of
Section 4.5, sum_max constraints that share a budget in one
Permission share their ptr, and an Authority Assertion's powers
contain no stateful constraint and, in an SD-JWT, no _sd member or
... array element. Otherwise malformed. Relations between
artifacts, and limits set by the Validation Profile, are checked in
later steps.¶
Profile conformance. Under the framework context: algorithms are
permitted (alg_not_allowed); Party Identifier schemes are accepted
(scheme_not_accepted); exp minus iat does not exceed the
max_validity entry for the artifact's typ, and the period of
every sum_max constraint does not exceed max_period
(lifetime_exceeded); and every artifact whose typ is in
status_required carries status (status_missing).¶
Signatures and keys. The root verifies under a mandate_issuer
anchor for the framework context (Section 9.1). Each sub-delegated
mandate carries a jwk header (key_missing), whose thumbprint
equals the parent's cnf.jkt (key_mismatch), and verifies with
it (signature_invalid). Each Authority Assertion verifies under
an authority_source anchor for the assertion's own tf. The WIT
verifies under an operator anchor for the framework context. An
attestation result verifies under a verifier anchor for the
framework context. A failed verification under an anchor gives the
codes stated in Section 9.1. For a sub-delegated mandate the three
checks are made in the order given, and the first that fails
records its code and ends this step for that mandate. The thumbprint
comparison needs the parent to have passed step 2; otherwise it is
skipped and the signature is still verified with the jwk.¶
Framework compatibility. Every mandate's tf equals the
framework context, and every Authority Assertion's tf is in the
context framework's authority_frameworks. Otherwise
framework_mismatch.¶
Time. For each required artifact, nbf (when present) is at
most T + max_clock_skew, and T is less than exp +
max_clock_skew. Otherwise not_yet_valid or expired.¶
Status. The applicable framework of an artifact is its own tf
for an Authority Assertion and the framework context for every other
artifact. For each required artifact with status, the Status List
Tokens in the inputs are filtered in three stages, in this order,
and if no token remains after a stage, the code is that stage's:¶
subject: the token has typ statuslist+jwt, its sub is the
status list URI referenced by the artifact's status, and its
status_list decodes to a list with an entry at the referenced
idx (status_unavailable);¶
anchor: some status_issuer anchor for the applicable framework,
whose publishes_for lists the artifact's issuer, has a key with
which the token's signature verifies and, if the token carries
iss, lists it (status_untrusted);¶
time: the token's iat is at most T + max_clock_skew, its
exp, when present, is later than T, and T minus its iat does
not exceed max_status_age (status_stale).¶
A token that fails two stages is counted at the first, so the code
does not depend on the order in which a Validator checks. A token
issued in the future gives status_stale, which means that no
trusted token is valid in time at T, not only that the tokens are
old.¶
The tokens that pass all three stages are eligible. Let the
candidates be the eligible tokens with the greatest iat. If they
give different status values at the referenced idx, the code is
status_conflict. Otherwise the Validator selects one candidate:
the one with the latest exp, a token without exp counting as
latest, and among those the one whose digest is first in code point
order. The selection does not depend on the order of the inputs and
is reported in status_evidence.¶
The selected status value gives
nothing if it is VALID (0x00), revoked if INVALID (0x01), and
suspended if SUSPENDED (0x02). Any other value, including
application-specific values, gives status_unrecognized, unless
the Validation Profile's status_values maps it to one of these
three. A later token showing reactivation prevails over an earlier
suspension.¶
Links. Each sub-delegated mandate is checked against its parent
(Section 4.8): its iss equals the parent's sub, its principal
equals the parent's, its exp is not later than the parent's, and,
if the parent has aud, it has aud containing only elements of
the parent's (chain_inconsistent); its max_depth is at most the
parent's minus 1 (depth_exceeded); its perms are attenuated with
respect to the parent's (not_attenuated). Equality of tf is
checked in step 5. Every code of this step carries the sub-delegated
mandate.¶
Authority. See Section 9.4.¶
Binding. If the PoP outcome is not ok, pop_failed. If the
leaf and the WIT each passed step 2 and the WIT does not match the
leaf (Section 6.1), binding_mismatch.¶
Audience. For each mandate in the chain with aud, the RP
identifier is an element of aud. Otherwise audience_mismatch.¶
Action match. The authorization_details array contains
exactly one object and, if its type is listed in types, the
object conforms to that Type Profile's schema. Otherwise
request_malformed, and the rest of this step is not performed.
An object of an unlisted type is not checked against a schema; it
matches no Permission. The alternatives are all Permissions of the
leaf that match the object at time T (Section 4.4). If there
are none, action_not_permitted. For each Permission that does not
match, the diagnostic perm_not_matching is recorded with the
Permission's index.¶
Optional evidence. Each attestation result and Exposure
Statement is checked as required evidence would be in steps 2 to 4,
6, and 7, and against Section 6.2 or Section 6.3. An Exposure Statement
also needs aud equal to the RP identifier, nonce equal to the
verified signature nonce, ad_hash equal to the digest of the
authorization_details bytes, and an exposure_observer anchor
whose observes lists the WIT's issuer. Failures are diagnostics
(evidence_rejected), and the artifact is listed under rejected
rather than evidence. If the leaf or the WIT failed step 2, or
the PoP outcome is not ok, every optional evidence artifact is
listed under rejected with evidence_rejected.¶
A step whose premise is absent is skipped and records nothing. An
artifact that failed step 2 is not examined by steps 3 to 8 and 10 to
13. If the root failed step 2, the authority check is not evaluated;
for an Authority Assertion that failed step 2, the authority check
reads only its parties (Section 9.4). Step 8 needs the
mandate and its parent, the match of step 10 the leaf and the WIT, and
steps 11 and 12 the leaf, each having passed step 2. The PoP part of
step 10 is always performed, so a presentation without a WIT records
pop_failed. An artifact passes a step if
the step recorded no code for it; an artifact without status
therefore passes step 7.¶
Each error has an effect, invalid or indeterminate, given in the
registry (Section 15.5). The five status codes of step 7,
status_unavailable, status_untrusted, status_stale,
status_conflict, and status_unrecognized, have the effect
indeterminate: they mean that status could not be resolved, not that
it was found negative. Every other error defined in this document has
the effect invalid. The outcome is invalid if an error with the
effect invalid was recorded; otherwise indeterminate if an error
was recorded; otherwise valid.¶
Each alternative carries the Obligations produced by its Permission's stateful constraints (Table 1), in the order of the constraints. An Obligation is a JSON object:¶
sum_max: members type ("sum_max"), constraint (index in the
Permission), root (an Artifact Reference (Section 4.3) to the
root mandate, equal to the first element of chain), budget,
period,
value, and amount (the resolved value of this request). Let A be
the authorization time (Section 10.2). The sum of the contributions
recorded under the same root and budget with a recording time t
such that A minus period < t <= A, plus amount, MUST NOT exceed
value. The contribution is recorded with time A.¶
cosign_above: present only when the resolved decimal exceeds
value; members type ("cosign_above"), constraint, value, and
amount. A second party designated by the RP's policy MUST approve
the specific action.¶
Alternatives are independent. Constraints in different Permissions
share accounting only when they name the same budget, which lets a
mandate issuer impose one limit across several Permissions. Because
sub-delegated sum_max constraints keep the parent's budget
(Table 2), actions taken under any mandate in a chain
count against the same budget.¶
The RP performs the check and records the contribution as one atomic operation at time A, so that concurrent requests cannot both pass against the same remaining budget, and a request validated earlier cannot use a window anchored at its validation time. Because each token authorizes one action, each token records exactly one contribution per budget. If the token expires unused, the RP MAY remove the contribution.¶
A sum_max constraint is a cumulative bound. From the chain alone,
the Validator establishes only that a child's sum_max is no wider
than its parent's (Section 4.7); whether a request keeps the total
within value can be known only where the running total for the
budget and period is held. The Validator therefore never reports such
a limit as satisfied; it returns an Obligation. An RP that neither
holds that total nor has the action authorized by a component that
does cannot discharge the Obligation, and MUST deny the request
(Section 10.1). [I-D.asor-wimse-agent-delegation-chain] applies
the same rule to its cumulative constraint types.¶
The Validation Result is a JSON object with the members:¶
outcome: valid, invalid, or indeterminate;¶
profile: an object with the string members uri, the Validation
Profile URI, and dig, its base64url-encoded SHA-256 digest
(Section 8);¶
anchors: an object with the same two members for the Trust Anchor
Set (Section 9.1);¶
time: T;¶
tf: the framework context, or null if undetermined;¶
chain: Artifact References for the mandates, root first;¶
errors and diagnostics: arrays of entries, each with the member
code and, as stated below, artifact (an Artifact Reference) and
perm (index);¶
authority: self, established, supported_status_unresolved,
refuted, or not_evaluated when no root was reached, the framework
context is not accepted, or the root failed step 2;¶
claims: attributed claims (Section 11), each with claim,
value, artifact, and role;¶
alternatives: an array of objects with perm (the leaf Permission
index) and obligations, sorted by perm. It is empty when the
outcome is invalid, because the RP has to deny the request then;¶
evidence and rejected: Artifact References for the optional
evidence that was accepted or rejected;¶
status_evidence: for each artifact whose status was read from a
selected Status List Token, an object with artifact (an Artifact
Reference), token (the base64url-encoded SHA-256 digest of the
selected token), iat and, when present, exp of the selected
token, and required (true for required evidence, false for
optional evidence), sorted by artifact.dig.¶
Every entry in errors and diagnostics carries artifact, except
entries with the codes chain_too_long, pop_failed,
request_malformed, action_not_permitted, and perm_not_matching.
artifact names the artifact the step was evaluating: for
chain_broken, the mandate whose parent has no matching artifact;
for key_missing, key_mismatch, chain_inconsistent,
depth_exceeded, and not_attenuated, the sub-delegated mandate; for
framework_not_accepted and the codes listed at the end of
Section 9.4, the root; for authority_not_presented, the
unresolved reference; for binding_mismatch, the WIT. For an artifact
that does not parse, the digest is computed over the string as
presented. perm appears only with perm_not_matching.¶
An Artifact Reference in a Validation Result has exactly the member
dig. The hints iss and jti of Section 4.3 are not copied, so
that two results do not differ only in hints.¶
claims contains only authenticated claims: claims of artifacts for
which step 4, or step 13 for optional evidence, was performed and
recorded no code. The claims of a sub-delegated mandate are
authenticated only if step 4 was performed for it and for every
mandate above it in chain and recorded no code for any of them. Claims of any other artifact are omitted; the artifact remains
identified through chain, errors, or rejected. Subject to that rule, claims contains exactly the
following, and nothing else:¶
for each mandate in chain, in order: iss, sub, principal,
delegator, perms, and loa if present;¶
for each Authority Assertion that supports the root, in the order of
the root's authority array: iss, principal, delegator,
powers, max_depth, iat, exp, and loa if present;¶
for the WIT: iss and sub;¶
for each accepted attestation result, in evidence order: iss,
eat_profile, and iat;¶
for each accepted Exposure Statement, in evidence order: iss,
sid, exposure, and iat.¶
Within an artifact, claims appear in the order listed. errors and
diagnostics are sorted by code, then artifact.dig, then perm,
comparing strings by code point and placing absent members first;
duplicates are removed. evidence and rejected are sorted by dig.¶
Two Validation Results are identical if they are identical JSON values
(Section 4.6), except that every number in a result, including a
number copied from an artifact into claims, is compared by
mathematical value, not by its text, so that a Validator that
re-serializes a result does not change it. This exception applies only
to results; matching and attenuation of Permissions use
Section 4.6 unchanged.¶
The authorization time A is read from the RP's clock inside the atomic
operation that discharges Obligations and issues the token. A is not
earlier than T. At A, the RP MUST check again that A is earlier than
the exp of every mandate in the chain, of every supporting Authority
Assertion, and of the WIT, plus max_clock_skew, and that every window
constraint of the selected alternative is satisfied at A; otherwise it
denies.¶
At A, the RP also checks whether each token listed in
status_evidence is still eligible: A minus its iat does not exceed
max_status_age, and its exp, when present, is later than A. The
treatment keeps the distinction between required and optional
evidence:¶
If a token for required evidence is no longer eligible, the RP MUST
either obtain fresh Status List Tokens and run the Mandate
Validation Procedure again with T = A, or treat the outcome as
indeterminate and apply its policy for that outcome.¶
If a token for optional evidence is no longer eligible, that evidence MUST NOT be relied on at A, and the RP applies its policy again without it. If the policy requires that evidence for the action, the RP denies or obtains fresh evidence and validates again.¶
The Validation Result computed at T is kept unchanged as a record of that validation; the checks at A are recorded with the authorization decision. A Validation Result therefore cannot carry a revocation check past the freshness the Validation Profile allows, however long the RP takes to decide, for example while waiting for a co-signature.¶
An access token issued under this specification:¶
MUST be sender-constrained to the key with the leaf's cnf.jkt;¶
MUST carry only the single authorization details object that was allowed;¶
MUST carry an act claim identifying the agent instance, and the
jti of the leaf and root mandates;¶
MUST have an exp no later than the earliest of: the exp of every
mandate in the chain, of every supporting Authority Assertion, and of
the WIT, the
exp of any window constraint in the selected alternative, and A
plus max_token_lifetime;¶
MUST authorize a single execution of the action; the resource server MUST reject a second use of the same token.¶
The bound on the token's exp ensures that the action cannot be
executed after a time window or a mandate has ended. A revocation after
issuance takes effect at the latest when the token expires; an RP that
needs it to take effect sooner validates again at execution.¶
Each artifact carries only the claims its issuer is in a position to make.¶
| Artifact | Issuer role | Asserts | Does not assert |
|---|---|---|---|
| Authority Assertion | Authority Source | delegator may delegate the stated powers for the principal, per the source's records | that any mandate was issued or intended |
| Root Mandate Assertion | Mandate Issuer | delegator granted the permissions to the key | that the delegator had authority |
| Sub-delegated Mandate Assertion | Delegating agent instance | further delegation within the parent's scope | anything beyond the parent |
| WIT | Operator | instance identifier bound to the key | model, configuration, behavior |
| Attestation result | Verifier | appraisal of runtime evidence at a point in time | later state; a remote model unless covered |
| Exposure Statement | Observer | exposure events recorded in the session attributed to one presentation, up to iat
|
absence of manipulation |
A Validator MUST report each claim with the artifact and role it came from, and MUST NOT treat a claim as established by an artifact whose role does not cover it. In particular, a Mandate Assertion alone never establishes the delegator's authority. Trust anchors are role-specific; an entity holding several roles SHOULD use a distinct key for each.¶
No artifact defined here asserts that the agent's reasoning is correct or that an action reflects the principal's present intent.¶
the formats of Mandate Assertions, Authority Assertions, and Exposure Statements, and the profiles of WIT and EAT;¶
the semantics of Permissions, constraint predicates, and attenuation;¶
the Validation Profile structure and the Mandate Validation Procedure, its codes, and its result;¶
the proof-of-possession profile and the rules for access tokens.¶
A Trust Framework is identified by the URI in tf. It MUST define:¶
the entities accepted for each role and how their anchors are distributed;¶
the Party Identifier schemes accepted;¶
the meaning of each loa value and the evidence it requires;¶
the permitted algorithms;¶
maximum lifetimes and when status is required;¶
values or bounds for the Validation Profile parameters;¶
requirements on Authority Sources, including the records they rely on, and which other frameworks' Authority Assertions are accepted;¶
the obligations and liability of issuers, including revocation and incident timelines;¶
retention of Validation Results and handling of disputes;¶
the authorization details types and their Type Profiles;¶
how a Mandate Issuer establishes that the instruction to issue a mandate came from the delegator named in it, for example by requiring the delegator's signature over the mandate content;¶
whether and how RPs share accounting for budgets.¶
The machine-checkable part of items 2 to 7 and 10 is expressed in the
Validation Profile. The protocol verifies that the delegator holds
authority, unless the Validation Profile admits self for the
delegator's scheme, and that the Mandate Issuer states that the delegator granted
the mandate. It cannot verify the link between the two inside the
delegator's organization; that link rests on the Mandate Issuer, under
item 11.¶
A Trust Framework can be a bilateral agreement, a sector scheme, or a regulated scheme. This document takes no position on which.¶
Issuer compromise. Short lifetimes limit the use of a stolen credential but not an attacker who controls an issuer and can issue new artifacts. The exposure window depends on detection, withdrawal of trust in the issuer, and propagation of that decision. Transparency logs [RFC9162] make suspicious issuance visible but do not prevent it. Trust Frameworks need distrust procedures.¶
Replay. Mandates are bound to a key; each request is signed with
it, and the signature's nonce, time window, and body digest prevent
reuse of a request. Access tokens are single-use. aud restricts where
a mandate may be presented.¶
Broad mandates. The format can express narrow mandates but cannot force issuers to write them. Trust Frameworks and RPs can require specific constraints for specific action types.¶
Cumulative limits across RPs. An RP accounts only for actions it
has allowed. A mandate accepted by several RPs that do not share state
lets an agent, compromised or not, reach a budget at each RP. Mandates
with sum_max constraints SHOULD therefore carry an aud naming
exactly one RP, unless the Trust Framework defines shared accounting.
Without either, a budget is a per-RP limit, not a limit on the mandate.¶
Prompt injection and confused deputies. A valid mandate shows that an action is within delegated authority, not that the agent was not manipulated into requesting it. Exposure Statements, constrained agent outputs, and RP policy reduce but do not remove this risk.¶
Status availability. When status cannot be resolved, the outcome
is indeterminate and the RP denies by default. The code says why:
no token, no trusted token, no token valid in time, conflicting
tokens, or an unrecognized value. The Validation Profile makes status
mandatory where the Trust Framework requires it, so an issuer cannot
avoid revocation checks by omitting it.¶
Revoked alternatives. When one referenced Authority Assertion
establishes authority, the codes of the other referenced assertions,
including revoked and expired, are diagnostics
(Section 9.4). A revocation by an Authority Source is a
signal that the delegator's powers were withdrawn, and the RP sees it
only if the withdrawn assertion was presented: the agent instance
selects what it presents, so a withdrawn assertion can simply be
omitted, and the Validator then records authority_not_presented for
it and has no artifact and no status to check. RP policy SHOULD examine diagnostics with
the codes revoked, suspended, and authority_not_presented before
allowing an action.¶
Trust Anchor Set. The Validator trusts the anchors it is given. A substituted or extended Trust Anchor Set lets an artifact verify under a role and framework its issuer was never accepted for; the digest in the result shows which set was used at T, not who vouched for it. Distribution of anchors is defined by the Trust Framework. A Trust Framework MAY require the set to be signed, with a JWS [RFC7515] with detached payload over the same bytes, as for the Validation Profile; the digest is computed over the bytes alone.¶
Resource consumption. max_chain_length bounds chain processing.
Validators SHOULD bound the number and size of artifacts.¶
Exact comparison. Amounts are decimal strings, pointers are exact, identity is defined on code points, and result arrays have a defined order, so independent implementations reach the same result.¶
Long-term verifiability. Validation Results retained for disputes may need to be verifiable for years. This requires preserving validation data and renewing evidence [RFC4998], and migrating to new algorithms, including post-quantum algorithms, as Trust Frameworks permit them.¶
Remote models. Attestation results cover what the Verifier appraised, not a model served by a third party unless that party's evidence was appraised.¶
Mandate Presentations disclose the principal and delegator to the RP. Issuers SHOULD use pairwise or role identifiers where the Trust Framework permits, and Authority Sources SHOULD use SD-JWT [RFC9901] for personal attributes of the delegator that do not affect validation. Digests and identifiers can correlate presentations across RPs. The privacy considerations of [I-D.ietf-oauth-status-list] apply.¶
This document requests registration of application/mandate+jwt,
application/authority+jwt, application/authority+sd-jwt, and
application/agent-exposure+jwt. Templates to be provided.¶
This document requests registration of the claims principal,
delegator, authority, perms, parent, max_depth, tf, loa,
powers, ad_hash, and exposure in the "JSON Web Token Claims"
registry. The Exposure Statement reuses the registered sid and
nonce claims with the meaning defined in Section 6.3.¶
This document requests registration of the token type URI
urn:ietf:params:oauth:token-type:agent-mandate in the "OAuth URI"
registry and of the parameter mandate_evidence in the "OAuth
Parameters" registry.¶
This document requests a new registry, "Agent Mandate Constraint Predicates", with Specification Required policy. Each entry contains the predicate name, its kind, its satisfaction rule, its attenuation rule, the value types it accepts, and a reference. Initial contents are given in Table 1 and Table 2.¶
This document requests a new registry, "Agent Mandate Validation Codes", with Specification Required policy. Each entry has:¶
the code;¶
"Recorded as": error, diagnostic, or both;¶
"Effect as error": invalid or indeterminate, for codes that can
be recorded as errors;¶
"Members": whether entries with the code carry artifact and perm
(Section 9.6);¶
the step that records it, and a reference.¶
Initial entries recorded as errors, with the effect invalid:
malformed, chain_broken, chain_too_long,
framework_not_accepted, alg_not_allowed, scheme_not_accepted,
lifetime_exceeded, status_missing, key_missing, key_mismatch,
signature_invalid, role_mismatch, framework_mismatch,
not_yet_valid, expired, revoked, suspended,
chain_inconsistent, depth_exceeded, not_attenuated,
self_not_permitted, authority_missing, authority_mismatch,
authority_insufficient, binding_mismatch, pop_failed,
audience_mismatch, request_malformed, action_not_permitted.¶
Initial entries recorded as errors, with the effect indeterminate:
status_unavailable, status_untrusted, status_stale,
status_conflict, status_unrecognized.¶
Of these, the codes recorded in steps 2 to 7 can also be recorded as diagnostics for a referenced Authority Assertion, as stated in Section 9.4.¶
Initial entries recorded only as diagnostics: perm_not_matching,
evidence_rejected, authority_not_presented.¶
The members of each initial entry are those stated in Section 9.6. A
new entry MUST state all the fields above, and the specification
requesting it MUST state in which step the code is recorded. The
designated experts SHOULD reject an entry with the effect
indeterminate that does not describe evidence that could not be
resolved, so that registrations cannot change what indeterminate
means.¶
This document requests a new registry, "Agent Exposure Event Types", with Specification Required policy. Initial values:¶
external_content: the session processed content retrieved from
outside the operator's domain that was not on an allow list;¶
unauthenticated_tool: the session invoked a tool or service whose
identity was not authenticated;¶
untrusted_agent_input: the session processed output from an agent
instance whose mandate was not validated.¶
A company's treasury agent holds a mandate from the company's financial director and delegates part of it to a reconciliation agent, which initiates a payment at the company's bank. Payloads are shown decoded and unsigned; identifiers are fictional; digests, keys, and some values are elided as "...". Signed vectors for this example under -00 have been published independently; they are expected to be regenerated for this revision.¶
The bank's Validation Profile includes a Type Profile for
payment_initiation whose admitted members are instructedAmount,
creditorAccount, and remittanceInformation. A Permission that does
not constrain one of them leaves it unrestricted.¶
Authority Assertion from a company register, stating which payments the director may delegate to agents:¶
{
"iss": "https://register.example",
"jti": "aa-5c1e",
"iat": 1792800000,
"exp": 1824336000,
"principal": {"id": "J40/0000/2020", "scheme": "urn:example:reg"},
"delegator": {"id": "p-41f9", "scheme": "urn:example:pairwise"},
"powers": [{
"type": "payment_initiation",
"constraints": [
{"pred": "eq", "ptr": "/instructedAmount/currency",
"value": "EUR"},
{"pred": "max", "ptr": "/instructedAmount/amount",
"value": "100000.00"}
]
}],
"max_depth": 1,
"tf": "https://tf.example/finance"
}
¶
Root Mandate Assertion to the treasury agent:¶
{
"iss": "https://mandates.treasury.example",
"sub": "spiffe://treasury.example/agents/payments-7",
"jti": "ma-90b2",
"iat": 1792886400,
"nbf": 1792886400,
"exp": 1795478400,
"cnf": {"jkt": "..."},
"principal": {"id": "J40/0000/2020", "scheme": "urn:example:reg"},
"delegator": {"id": "p-41f9", "scheme": "urn:example:pairwise"},
"authority": [{"dig": "...", "iss": "https://register.example"}],
"perms": [{
"type": "payment_initiation",
"actions": ["initiate"],
"locations": ["https://bank.example/payments"],
"constraints": [
{"pred": "eq", "ptr": "/instructedAmount/currency",
"value": "EUR"},
{"pred": "max", "ptr": "/instructedAmount/amount",
"value": "20000.00"},
{"pred": "in", "ptr": "/creditorAccount/iban",
"value": ["RO49AAAA1B31007593840000",
"DE89370400440532013000"]},
{"pred": "sum_max", "ptr": "/instructedAmount/amount",
"value": "50000.00", "period": 2592000,
"budget": "monthly-out"},
{"pred": "cosign_above", "ptr": "/instructedAmount/amount",
"value": "10000.00"}
]
}],
"max_depth": 1,
"aud": ["https://bank.example"],
"tf": "https://tf.example/finance",
"loa": "substantial"
}
¶
Protected header of the sub-delegated mandate, carrying the treasury agent's public key:¶
{
"typ": "mandate+jwt",
"alg": "EdDSA",
"jwk": {"kty": "OKP", "crv": "Ed25519", "x": "..."}
}
¶
Sub-delegated Mandate Assertion to the reconciliation agent:¶
{
"iss": "spiffe://treasury.example/agents/payments-7",
"sub": "spiffe://treasury.example/agents/reconcile-2",
"jti": "ma-17c4",
"iat": 1792890000,
"nbf": 1792890000,
"exp": 1792976400,
"cnf": {"jkt": "..."},
"principal": {"id": "J40/0000/2020", "scheme": "urn:example:reg"},
"delegator": {"id": "spiffe://treasury.example/agents/payments-7",
"scheme": "urn:example:workload"},
"parent": {"dig": "..."},
"perms": [{
"type": "payment_initiation",
"actions": ["initiate"],
"locations": ["https://bank.example/payments"],
"constraints": [
{"pred": "eq", "ptr": "/instructedAmount/currency",
"value": "EUR"},
{"pred": "max", "ptr": "/instructedAmount/amount",
"value": "5000.00"},
{"pred": "eq", "ptr": "/creditorAccount/iban",
"value": "DE89370400440532013000"},
{"pred": "sum_max", "ptr": "/instructedAmount/amount",
"value": "20000.00", "period": 2592000,
"budget": "monthly-out"},
{"pred": "cosign_above", "ptr": "/instructedAmount/amount",
"value": "5000.00"}
]
}],
"aud": ["https://bank.example"],
"tf": "https://tf.example/finance"
}
¶
Requested authorization detail:¶
{
"type": "payment_initiation",
"actions": ["initiate"],
"locations": ["https://bank.example/payments"],
"instructedAmount": {"currency": "EUR", "amount": "4000.00"},
"creditorAccount": {"iban": "DE89370400440532013000"}
}
¶
Validation Result, abbreviated. The amount does not exceed the co-signature threshold, so the only Obligation is the shared budget:¶
{
"outcome": "valid",
"profile": {"uri": "https://bank.example/profiles/agents/3",
"dig": "..."},
"anchors": {"uri": "https://bank.example/anchors/7",
"dig": "..."},
"time": 1792972800,
"tf": "https://tf.example/finance",
"chain": [{"dig": "..."}, {"dig": "..."}],
"errors": [],
"diagnostics": [],
"authority": "established",
"claims": ["..."],
"alternatives": [{
"perm": 0,
"obligations": [{
"type": "sum_max", "constraint": 3, "root": {"dig": "..."},
"budget": "monthly-out", "period": 2592000,
"value": "20000.00", "amount": "4000.00"
}]
}],
"evidence": [],
"rejected": [],
"status_evidence": []
}
¶
At authorization time A, the bank checks again that both mandates, the
Authority Assertion, and the WIT are unexpired, records 4000.00 against
budget monthly-out of the root mandate, identified by its digest, in
the same atomic operation, and
issues a single-use token whose exp is no later than 1792976400, the
exp of the sub-delegated mandate.¶
Each case lists the expected outcome, the errors, and, where relevant, the diagnostics and other members of the result. Signed test vectors exist for some of the authority cases under -00 and are planned for every case.¶
| Case | Expected result |
|---|---|
Valid chain with two delegations; keys in jwk headers |
valid
|
Sub-delegated mandate without jwk header |
invalid, key_missing
|
Authority Assertion under a framework not in authority_frameworks
|
invalid; framework_mismatch, authority_insufficient
|
Request matching two Permissions with different sum_max
|
valid; two alternatives, each with its own Obligations |
| Valid mandate plus attestation result with a bad signature |
valid; evidence_rejected diagnostic |
Child sum_max with period longer than the parent's |
valid; Obligation of type sum_max with the child's budget, period, and value
|
Request whose sum_max pointer resolves to a negative amount, the leaf having only that Permission |
invalid, action_not_permitted; perm_not_matching with perm 0 |
SD-JWT Authority Assertion with _sd inside powers
|
invalid; malformed, authority_insufficient
|
| No Status List Token presented for a mandate's required status |
indeterminate, status_unavailable
|
| No Status List Token presented only for the supporting Authority Assertion |
indeterminate, status_unavailable; authority is supported_status_unresolved; no authority error |
| Two eligible Status List Tokens for a mandate; later one revokes |
invalid, revoked
|
Two eligible Status List Tokens for a mandate with equal iat and different status |
indeterminate, status_conflict
|
| Child adds a constraint on a member the parent does not admit |
invalid, not_attenuated
|
Root constrains a member admitted by the Type Profile but absent from powers
|
valid
|
Root max_depth greater than the Authority Assertion's |
invalid, authority_insufficient
|
| Exposure Statement reused with a new signature nonce |
evidence_rejected diagnostic |
| Exposure Statement presented at a second RP |
evidence_rejected diagnostic (aud mismatch) |
Forged Exposure Statement copying a legitimate iss and jti
|
evidence_rejected; consumption record unchanged |
| Authentic Exposure Statement presented with another agent's key or nonce |
evidence_rejected; later legitimate presentation succeeds |
Accepted Exposure Statement in a presentation that is invalid
|
invalid, binding_mismatch; request rejected; statement not consumed |
| Accepted Exposure Statement, action later refused by RP policy | statement remains consumed |
Two Status List Tokens with equal iat and status, different exp
|
token with later exp selected, regardless of input order |
| Only an optional evidence status token too old at A | evidence not relied on; RP policy reapplied; outcome unchanged |
| Exposure Statement reused at the same RP after the first signature expired | request rejected by the authorization server (consumed jti) |
Status List Token for a mandate fresh at T but older than max_status_age at A |
fresh validation at A, or indeterminate path |
Two sum_max with the same budget and different ptr in one Permission |
invalid, malformed
|
Validation Profile with a schema lacking $schema 2020-12 |
profile refused; no validation |
| Chain without a reachable root |
invalid, chain_broken; authority is not_evaluated
|
| Mandate in the chain with an invalid signature |
invalid, signature_invalid on that mandate; its claims and those of every mandate below it omitted |
| Status issuer of a mandate accepted only under another framework |
indeterminate, status_untrusted
|
Status value 0x03 for a mandate with no mapping in status_values
|
indeterminate, status_unrecognized
|
| Two requests validated at the same T, both within budget alone | second denied at authorization time A |
Token used after the sub-delegated mandate's exp
|
rejected at the resource server |
Root perms broader than the referenced assertion's powers
|
invalid, authority_insufficient; alternatives empty |
| Root references one Authority Assertion that is not presented |
invalid, authority_missing; authority_not_presented diagnostic |
Root references one Authority Assertion that is past its exp
|
invalid; expired, authority_insufficient
|
| Root references two Authority Assertions, one established and one not presented |
valid; authority_not_presented diagnostic |
| Root references two Authority Assertions, one established and one expired |
valid; expired diagnostic |
Only Status List Token for a mandate older than max_status_age
|
indeterminate, status_stale
|
Only Status List Token for a mandate issued after T + max_clock_skew
|
indeterminate, status_stale
|
| Only Status List Token for a mandate both from an issuer not accepted and too old |
indeterminate, status_untrusted
|
sum_max with period above the framework's max_period
|
invalid, lifetime_exceeded
|
Sub-delegated mandate whose principal differs from the parent's |
invalid, chain_inconsistent
|
Sub-delegated mandate whose exp is later than the parent's |
invalid, chain_inconsistent
|
Root with delegator equal to principal under a scheme not in self_schemes
|
invalid, self_not_permitted; authority is self
|
Root with delegator equal to principal that carries authority
|
invalid, malformed; authority is not_evaluated
|
Root tf without an entry in frameworks
|
invalid, framework_not_accepted only; authority is not_evaluated; claims empty |
Request whose type has no Type Profile |
invalid, action_not_permitted; perm_not_matching for each Permission |
| Request that fails its Type Profile schema |
invalid, request_malformed; no perm_not_matching
|
Carrying the chain in the format of
[I-D.asor-wimse-agent-delegation-chain], intended for the next
revision: an
amount type and a per-period type defined here and registered in its
constraint type registry, cosign_above kept as a requirement on the
RP outside the chain constraints, and a decision on window.¶
The record of the authorization decision, its binding outside the RP's control, and the retention of the bytes that Validation Results reference, planned for the next revision.¶
Fixing in the Validation Result the set of Status List Tokens presented, not only the one selected, so that an unresolved status can be checked afterwards.¶
Whether claims should report the powers of an authenticated
Authority Assertion that does not support the root, so that the RP
sees what produced authority_insufficient.¶
A CBOR/CWT encoding.¶
Presentation outside OAuth Token Exchange.¶
Shared budget accounting across RPs.¶
Cumulative limits on a delegator's authority across root mandates, for example a budget identifier issued by the Authority Source.¶
Several actions in one request or token, with atomic reservation for the whole batch.¶
A predicate for refunds and reversals.¶
Signed test vectors for every conformance case.¶
A human-readable rendering of mandates for delegator consent.¶
Validation Result: anchors fixes the Trust Anchor Set by URI and
digest; status_evidence and the claims of supporting Authority
Assertions carry iat and exp; every entry in errors and
diagnostics has a defined form; references carry only dig;
alternatives is empty when the outcome is invalid; numbers are
compared by value.¶
Trust Anchor Set: defined as a JSON document. Anchors list issuer identifiers, and "verifies under an anchor" is defined once.¶
Validation Profile: iss added, with an optional detached signature;
max_lifetime renamed max_validity and keyed by typ, to avoid a
clash with the asor constraint type of the same name; max_period
moved out of it into a member of its own; self_schemes added; Type
Profile members named.¶
Status: status_unavailable now means only that no token for the
list was presented. status_untrusted, status_stale,
status_conflict, and status_unrecognized report the other cases
that -00 reported as status_unavailable, with the same outcome.¶
Authority check: the references in authority are alternatives;
codes of other referenced assertions become diagnostics when
authority is established; authority_not_presented lists each
reference not presented; self is restricted by self_schemes; the
value unknown is renamed supported_status_unresolved.¶
Procedure: step 2 checks the content rules of Section 4 and
Section 5; step 8 checks every condition of Section 4.8, with the
new code chain_inconsistent; skipped steps and requests of unlisted
types are defined; the outcome follows the effect of each code.¶
Constraints: the value type of each predicate is fixed; a value
of another type is malformed; a sum_max period above
max_period is lifetime_exceeded.¶
Authorization: the checks at A and the access token's exp also
respect the WIT's exp; an RP that cannot discharge a sum_max
Obligation denies; a cosign_above Obligation appears only above
its threshold.¶
Procedure, further: chain_too_long means no root is reached; when
no accepted framework context exists, optional evidence is rejected;
artifacts in mandate_evidence that are neither in the chain nor
referenced are ignored; pop_failed is recorded even without a WIT;
the WIT requires iat; step 4 names the verifier anchor and the
order of checks for a sub-delegated mandate; step 7 checks the
token's typ, sub, and list entry; SD-JWT disclosures are ignored;
the claims of a sub-delegated mandate need every ancestor verified.¶
Budgets are keyed by a reference to the root mandate, not its jti.¶
Registry of validation codes: "Recorded as", "Effect as error", and members per code.¶
Conformance cases corrected and extended.¶
Douglas Wadkins asked that the evidence a decision relied on, and its
freshness, be determinable afterwards. J S He found the gaps in the
authority check, proposed the authority cases in Appendix B, and
published the first signed vectors for this document. Kieran Sweeney
pointed out the clash of max_lifetime with the asor constraint type.
Girish Konda and Elena Tanase asked that missing, stale, and
conflicting status be reported apart. Rafael Asor indicated that the
constraint type registry of his draft could take the decimal amount
and per-period types defined here.¶