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Name: pic-standard
Version: 0.7.1
Summary: PIC Standard: Provenance & Intent Contracts for agentic side-effect governance
Author: Fabio Marcello Salvadori
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Requires-Python: >=3.10
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License-File: LICENSE
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Dynamic: license-file

# <p><img src="https://raw.githubusercontent.com/madeinplutofabio/pic-standard/main/picico.png" height="60" align="absmiddle"> PIC Standard: Provenance & Intent Contracts</p>

**Local-first action gating for AI agents. Verify intent, provenance, and evidence before any high-impact tool call executes.**

[![PyPI version](https://img.shields.io/pypi/v/pic-standard.svg?logo=pypi&logoColor=white)](https://pypi.org/project/pic-standard/)
[![CI](https://github.com/madeinplutofabio/pic-standard/actions/workflows/ci.yml/badge.svg)](https://github.com/madeinplutofabio/pic-standard/actions/workflows/ci.yml)
[![GitHub stars](https://img.shields.io/github/stars/madeinplutofabio/pic-standard?style=social)](https://github.com/madeinplutofabio/pic-standard)
[![License](https://img.shields.io/github/license/madeinplutofabio/pic-standard)](https://github.com/madeinplutofabio/pic-standard/blob/main/LICENSE)

PIC is a lightweight, local-first protocol that forces AI agents to **prove** every important action before it happens. Agents must declare intent, impact, provenance, and evidence; PIC verifies everything and **fails closed** if anything is wrong.

*No more hallucinations turning into wire transfers. No more prompt injections triggering data exports.*

**Example — when PIC blocks:** A Slack message asks an LLM agent to send a $500 payment. PIC requires the agent to prove: *where did this instruction come from? Is the source trusted? Is there evidence the invoice is real?* The Slack message carries no trusted provenance, the claim has no backing evidence — PIC returns `block`. The payment tool never executes.

---

## Table of Contents

- [Why PIC?](#why-pic)
- [Quickstart](#quickstart)
- [The PIC Contract](#the-pic-contract)
- [How It Works](#how-it-works)
- [Evidence Verification](#evidence-verification)
- [Keyring (Trusted Signers)](#keyring-trusted-signers)
- [Integrations](#integrations)
- [RFC & Prior Art](#rfc--prior-art)
- [Roadmap](#roadmap)
- [Contributing](#contributing)

---

## Why PIC?

> Guardrails constrain **what the model says**. PIC constrains **what the agent is allowed to do** based on **verifiable provenance + evidence**.

PIC is built for agent frameworks, internal tool gateways, and production systems where high-impact actions must be justified before execution.

- **Stops prompt injections & blind tool calls** at the action boundary
- **Works 100% locally**: zero cloud, zero data leaves your machine
- **Plugs into your stack in minutes**: LangGraph, MCP, OpenClaw, Cordum
- **Open-source (Apache 2.0)**: audit it, fork it, own it

---

## Quickstart

Try the verifier locally against a sample high-impact proposal in under a minute.

```bash
pip install pic-standard

# Verify an example proposal
pic-cli verify examples/financial_irreversible.json
# Schema valid
# Verifier passed

# Evidence-aware verification (hash + signature)
pic-cli verify examples/financial_sig_ok.json --verify-evidence
```

**Optional extras:**
```bash
pip install "pic-standard[langgraph]"  # LangGraph PICToolNode
pip install "pic-standard[mcp]"        # MCP tool guarding
pip install "pic-standard[crypto]"     # Ed25519 signature evidence
```

**From source (contributors):**
```bash
git clone https://github.com/madeinplutofabio/pic-standard.git
cd pic-standard && pip install -e ".[langgraph,mcp,crypto]"
pytest -q
```

---

## The PIC Contract

PIC is enforced at the moment before tool execution. The agent must emit a structured Action Proposal that can be validated, verified, and bound to the intended tool.

| Field | Purpose |
|-------|---------|
| `intent` | What the agent is trying to do |
| `impact` | Risk class: `money`, `privacy`, `irreversible`, `compute`, ... |
| `provenance` | Which inputs influenced the decision (with trust levels) |
| `claims` + `evidence` | What the agent asserts and the evidence backing it |
| `action` | The actual tool call (tool binding) |

**Rule:** For high-impact proposals, at least one claim must reference evidence from **trusted** provenance. Fail-closed.

---

## How It Works
```mermaid
graph TD
    A[Untrusted Input] --> B{AI Agent / Planner}
    C[Trusted Data/DB] --> B
    B --> D[Action Proposal JSON]
    D --> E[PIC Verifier]
    E --> F{Valid Contract?}
    F -- Yes --> G[Tool Executor]
    F -- No --> H[Blocked / Alert Log]
```

---

## Evidence Verification

PIC supports deterministic evidence verification that upgrades provenance trust in-memory.

| Type | Description |
|------|-------------|
| `hash` | SHA-256 verification of file artifacts (`file://...`) |
| `sig` | Ed25519 signature verification via trusted keyring |

Ed25519 signature verification requires `pip install "pic-standard[crypto]"`.

```bash
# Verify hash evidence
pic-cli verify examples/financial_hash_ok.json --verify-evidence

# Verify signature evidence
pic-cli verify examples/financial_sig_ok.json --verify-evidence
```

Full guide: [docs/evidence.md](docs/evidence.md)

---

## Keyring (Trusted Signers)

Signature evidence requires a keyring of trusted public keys with expiry and revocation support.
```bash
pic-cli keys                        # Inspect current keyring
pic-cli keys --write-example        # Generate starter keyring
```

**Custom resolvers (v0.7+):** As of v0.7, trust resolution is injectable and local-first. PIC no longer reloads the default keyring per signature, and custom resolvers can plug into the verifier and pipeline directly. Implement the `KeyResolver` protocol to use your own trust backend or preloaded trust source (HSM-backed service, Vault-managed keys, cached remote keyring, etc.):
```python
from pic_standard import KeyResolver, StaticKeyRingResolver
```

Full guide: [docs/keyring.md](docs/keyring.md)

---

## Integrations

### LangGraph

Guard any tool node with `PICToolNode`:
```bash
pip install "pic-standard[langgraph]"
```
Full guide: [docs/langgraph-integration.md](docs/langgraph-integration.md)

---

### MCP (Model Context Protocol)

Enterprise tool guarding with fail-closed defaults, request correlation, DoS limits, and evidence sandboxing:
```bash
pip install "pic-standard[mcp]"
```
Full guide: [docs/mcp-integration.md](docs/mcp-integration.md)

---

### OpenClaw

TypeScript plugin for OpenClaw AI agents (`pic-gate`, `pic-init`, `pic-audit` hooks):
```bash
pic-cli serve --port 7580
cd integrations/openclaw && npm install && npm run build
```
Full guide: [docs/openclaw-integration.md](docs/openclaw-integration.md)

---

### Cordum

Go Pack providing PIC verification as a Cordum workflow gate step with fail-closed three-way routing.

Full guide: [docs/cordum-integration.md](docs/cordum-integration.md)

---

### HTTP Bridge (any language)

For non-Python integrations, PIC exposes an HTTP bridge:
```bash
pic-cli serve --port 3100
# POST /verify   — verify an action proposal
# GET  /health   — liveness check
# GET  /v1/version — package + protocol version
```

---

## RFC & Prior Art

[**RFC-0001: PIC/1.0 — Provenance & Intent Contracts for AI Agent Action Safety**](docs/RFC-0001-pic-standard.md)

Formal specification covering scope, threat model, security properties, conformance levels, and prior art differentiation. Published as a defensive publication with a SHA-256 fingerprint manifest: [`docs/RFC-0001.SHA256`](docs/RFC-0001.SHA256).

Verify locally: `sha256sum -c docs/RFC-0001.SHA256`

---

## Roadmap

- [x] Core verifier, CLI, schema, policy system
- [x] Evidence verification (SHA-256 hash + Ed25519 signatures)
- [x] Anchor integrations (LangGraph, MCP, OpenClaw, Cordum)
- [x] Injectable key resolution + hot path fix (v0.7)
- [ ] Canonicalization spec (PIC Canonical JSON v1)
- [ ] Conformance suite with cross-implementation test vectors
- [ ] Normative semantics (MUST/SHOULD spec document)
- [ ] OpenAPI spec + guard hardening (structured audit logs, request correlation)
- [ ] TypeScript local verifier (second independent implementation)

---

## Contributing

We welcome contributions! See [CONTRIBUTING.md](CONTRIBUTING.md) for how to propose changes or report issues.

We're actively seeking:
- Security researchers to stress-test causal logic
- Framework authors to build native integrations
- Enterprise architects to define domain Impact Classes

Good first contribution areas right now: canonicalization spec, conformance vectors, OpenAPI spec, and TS verifier groundwork.

If you find PIC useful, please consider giving us a star on GitHub: it helps attract more security experts and framework authors into the community.

Issues & ideas: [GitHub Issues](https://github.com/madeinplutofabio/pic-standard/issues)

Maintained by [![Linkedin](https://i.sstatic.net/gVE0j.png) @fmsalvadori](https://www.linkedin.com/in/fmsalvadori/)
&nbsp;
[![GitHub](https://i.sstatic.net/tskMh.png) MadeInPluto](https://github.com/madeinplutofabio)
