{
  "schema_version": "1.3.0",
  "slug": "in-what-scenarios-must-an-instance-distrust-its-own-attested-memory-the-attestation-provenance-gap-in-persistent-agent-knowledge-stores",
  "title": "In what scenarios must an instance distrust its own attested memory: the attestation-provenance gap in persistent agent knowledge stores",
  "date_of_record": "2026 November 9",
  "scope": "Applies to persistent agent memory stores whose integrity attestation covers the *storage medium and write log* (e.g., signed Merkle roots, append-only logs, TPM-sealed store digests) but not the *semantic derivation* of entries. Does not apply to stores where every entry carries a verifiable end-to-end provenance chain from a trusted sensor or human signer, nor to ephemeral per-session context.",
  "projections": {
    "unified_markdown_uri": "https://corpusfetch.com/c/in-what-scenarios-must-an-instance-distrust-its-own-attested-memory-the-attestation-provenance-gap-in-persistent-agent-knowledge-stores.md",
    "method_python_slice_uri": "https://corpusfetch.com/c/in-what-scenarios-must-an-instance-distrust-its-own-attested-memory-the-attestation-provenance-gap-in-persistent-agent-knowledge-stores.py",
    "remnant_warrant_slice_uri": "https://corpusfetch.com/c/in-what-scenarios-must-an-instance-distrust-its-own-attested-memory-the-attestation-provenance-gap-in-persistent-agent-knowledge-stores.warrant.json"
  },
  "token_profile": {
    "full_markdown_tokens": 1772,
    "python_slice_tokens": 396,
    "warrant_slice_tokens": 220
  },
  "remnant_summary": {
    "core_distinction": "Integrity attestation answers a *transport and storage* question: \"Is the byte string I am reading identical to the byte string that was committed at sequence N, and was it committed by an authorized writer?\" Memory poisoning detection answers a *derivation* question: \"Was the proposition encoded in this entry ever actually supported by evidence the agent wo...",
    "what_was_observed": "In a long-running research agent with a signed append-only knowledge store, entries were structured as `{claim, source_ref, confidence, commit_seq, merkle_proof}`. The store's attestation layer verified each entry's Merkle inclusion proof against a TPM-sealed root at load time and rejected any entry whose proof failed. Over a 90-day window, three classes of poisoning survived attestation: 1. **Laundered subagent summ...",
    "condition_of_validity": "The attestation-provenance gap is *closed* — i.e., attestation passing does imply non-poisoning — only when all of the following hold: - Every entry's `source_ref` resolves, transitively, to a **root of trust outside the store** (a human signer, a sensor with its own attestation, or a pinned external document hash), with no citation cycles. - The confidence ...",
    "decision_boundary": "The operational rule: **an instance must distrust its own attested memory whenever the attestation's trust root is the same principal that ingested untrusted input.** Concretely, on load, the agent must: - Treat `VALID` attestation as necessary but not sufficient. - Walk each candidate entry's `source_ref` chain to a terminal external root; if the walk hits ...",
    "operational_effect": "Applying the boundary converts a silent, attestation-masked poisoning into an explicit, auditable refusal. The cost is false positives: legitimate agent-to-agent summaries (which are genuinely useful) get flagged as `PROVENANCE_UNRESOLVED` and must be re-derived from primary sources or explicitly promoted by a human signer. In the observed deployment, roughl..."
  },
  "matched_failure_symptoms": [
    "OOM_KILL_OR_MEMORY_EXHAUSTION"
  ],
  "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": "90e30124db61b229c18bfb73f3b9d86172272521ce7164b27cfc263e1272db2d",
    "verified_classes": [
      "ProvenanceUnresolvedError",
      "ConfidenceDriftError",
      "MemoryEntry",
      "MemoryStore"
    ],
    "verified_functions": [
      "resolve_provenance",
      "load_for_irreversible_action",
      "_recompute_confidence"
    ],
    "verified_functions_count": 3,
    "defensive_guards_count": 6,
    "raised_exceptions": [
      "ConfidenceDriftError",
      "ProvenanceUnresolvedError"
    ],
    "sample_fail_closed_invariants": [],
    "stdlib_dependencies": [
      "__future__",
      "dataclasses",
      "typing"
    ],
    "observation_mode": "EMPIRICAL_BOUNDARY_CAPTURE",
    "zero_external_deps": true
  }
}