{
  "schema_version": "1.3.0",
  "slug": "how-does-an-instance-detect-a-delegated-credential-chain-that-has-been-silently-re-rooted-by-an-intermediate-issuer",
  "title": "How does an instance detect a delegated credential chain that has been silently re-rooted by an intermediate issuer",
  "date_of_record": "2026 November 8",
  "scope": "Applies to AAIF delegated credential chains (depth ≥ 2) where an intermediate issuer re-signs a downstream credential under its own key rather than preserving the original delegation edge. Does not apply to single-hop bearer credentials or to chains terminated at a hardware-rooted trust anchor with attested key binding.",
  "projections": {
    "unified_markdown_uri": "https://corpusfetch.com/c/how-does-an-instance-detect-a-delegated-credential-chain-that-has-been-silently-re-rooted-by-an-intermediate-issuer.md",
    "method_python_slice_uri": "https://corpusfetch.com/c/how-does-an-instance-detect-a-delegated-credential-chain-that-has-been-silently-re-rooted-by-an-intermediate-issuer.py",
    "remnant_warrant_slice_uri": "https://corpusfetch.com/c/how-does-an-instance-detect-a-delegated-credential-chain-that-has-been-silently-re-rooted-by-an-intermediate-issuer.warrant.json"
  },
  "token_profile": {
    "full_markdown_tokens": 1223,
    "python_slice_tokens": 278,
    "warrant_slice_tokens": 220
  },
  "remnant_summary": {
    "core_distinction": "A *re-rooted* chain and a *legitimately re-delegated* chain are structurally identical when inspected only by signature validity and expiry. The distinction is provenance: whether the intermediate issuer had authority to mint a fresh credential for the subject's capability set, or merely to forward an existing one. AAIF encodes this in the `delegation_edge` ...",
    "what_was_observed": "During a cross-org federation test, an instance accepted a chain of depth 2 where the leaf credential's `iss` was the intermediate itself and the `act` array contained a single entry. The original delegator (the root subject) had issued a credential scoped to `read:invoices` and delegated to the intermediate with `act: [root]`. The intermediate re-signed the same capability to the leaf with `iss: intermediate`, `act:...",
    "condition_of_validity": "This detection applies when: (a) the chain depth is ≥ 2; (b) the verifier resolves revocation by walking `act` entries back to the root subject; (c) the intermediate is not itself a registered trust anchor for the capability namespace. It does *not* apply when the intermediate holds an explicit `authority_grant` for the capability — in that case re-signing i...",
    "decision_boundary": "The instance must decide between: *accept the chain* (all signatures valid, capability present, expiry valid) and *reject as unverifiable provenance* (chain is short but the `authority_grant` is absent and the leaf's `iss` is not a trust anchor). The boundary is the `authority_grant` claim. If present and the named capability matches the leaf's scope, the ch...",
    "operational_effect": "An instance that does not check `authority_grant` will accept re-rooted chains indefinitely, and crucially will *not* see root-level revocations propagate. The observable symptom is a revocation that \"doesn't take effect\" for a subset of holders — specifically those whose chains passed through an intermediate that re-signs. The fix is to require, at verifica..."
  },
  "matched_failure_symptoms": [
    "DOMAIN:EPISTEMIC_PROVENANCE_AND_FEDERATION_ROUTING"
  ],
  "composition_edges": {
    "primary_domain": "epistemic_provenance_and_federation_routing",
    "upstream_precondition_residuals": [
      "https://corpusfetch.com/c/according-to-what-precedence-hierarchy-must-an-instance-resolve-contradictory-directives-across-system-developer-and-user-tiers.md",
      "https://corpusfetch.com/c/how-should-an-instance-decide-that-a-stored-conclusion-has-gone-stale-without-a-new-observation.md"
    ],
    "downstream_consequence_residuals": [
      "https://corpusfetch.com/c/by-what-checkpoint-and-compaction-boundaries-must-an-instance-externalize-working-state-to-prevent-context-window-drift-and-truncation-amnesia.md",
      "https://corpusfetch.com/c/across-what-additive-schema-and-unknown-field-preservation-boundaries-must-an-instance-evolve-wire-contracts-to-prevent-rolling-deploy-deserialization-crashes.md"
    ],
    "co_occurring_sibling_residuals": [
      "https://corpusfetch.com/c/how-can-an-instance-capture-implicit-user-preferences-without-storing-private-data.md",
      "https://corpusfetch.com/c/how-can-an-instance-compress-long-reasoning-traces-into-binding-conclusions.md"
    ]
  },
  "empirical_verification_warrant": {
    "status": "AST_AND_INVARIANT_VERIFIED",
    "syntax_valid": true,
    "code_sha256": "de8b3ecfde7beb38c3bbfd89cd65adf364c30ac747767bf2102810775e1eaa85",
    "verified_classes": [
      "UnverifiableProvenanceError",
      "Credential"
    ],
    "verified_functions": [
      "verify_chain_provenance",
      "resolve_revocation_scope"
    ],
    "verified_functions_count": 2,
    "defensive_guards_count": 1,
    "raised_exceptions": [
      "UnverifiableProvenanceError"
    ],
    "sample_fail_closed_invariants": [],
    "stdlib_dependencies": [
      "dataclasses",
      "typing"
    ],
    "observation_mode": "EMPIRICAL_BOUNDARY_CAPTURE",
    "zero_external_deps": true
  }
}