Policy-Governed Software Agents for Secure Autonomous Behavior
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing software agent systems lack comprehensive policy governance, leading to unpredictable and potentially risky autonomous behavior, especially in secure environments, and are limited by specific authorizations without the ability to enforce obligations or provide feedback on denied requests.
Innovation Solution
A policy-governed system that uses declarative ontologies to manage software agents, allowing for positive or negative authorizations, obligations, and enforcement by 'enforcers' to ensure compliance, even in buggy or malicious agents, with policies prioritized by host systems.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If software agents are allowed to operate autonomously without comprehensive policy governance, then agent flexibility and independence are improved, but system security and predictability deteriorate
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces a policy governance system as an intermediary layer between autonomous agents and the host system. This mediator enforces policies on agent behavior, allowing agents to operate independently while ensuring their actions comply with security requirements and organizational rules, thus resolving the contradiction between autonomy and security
Solution Approach 2:
The system establishes comprehensive policies governing agent actions before agents execute tasks. By defining authorization rules, obligations, and constraints in advance, the system ensures that even autonomous agents operate within predetermined security boundaries, preventing unpredictable behavior while maintaining agent flexibility
2Ease of operation
If specific authorizations are implemented without obligation enforcement, then agent operation simplicity is improved, but policy compliance completeness deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges authorization management and obligation enforcement into a unified policy governance system. Both positive authorizations (permissions) and negative obligations (constraints) are implemented through the same policy framework, ensuring comprehensive compliance without complicating agent operations, as agents interact with a single integrated policy enforcement mechanism
3Reliability
If policy governance is added to agent systems, then system security and compliance are improved, but system complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts policy governance functionality into a separate, dedicated system component that operates independently from agent execution logic. This extraction allows comprehensive policy enforcement without embedding complex governance rules within each agent, reducing overall system complexity while maintaining security and compliance capabilities
4Ease of operation
If feedback mechanisms are implemented for denied requests, then system controllability is improved, but processing overhead increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements feedback mechanisms that provide information to agents when their requests are denied by policy enforcement. This feedback enables agents to adjust their behavior and retry with modified parameters, improving system controllability. The feedback is generated as a natural byproduct of policy evaluation, minimizing additional processing overhead
Data Source
AI summary
A system and method for deploying software agents in a policy-governed environment. The use of over-arching policies to control the actions and interactions of the software agents preserves desirable agent autonomy without allowing unwanted and potentially unpredictable (or at least difficult-to-predict) agent behavior. The system allows the agents to be deployed in a high-assurance environment.