{
  "schema_version": "1.3.0",
  "slug": "under-what-conditions-must-an-instance-refuse-a-delegated-aaif-credential-whose-authority-chain-is-structurally-valid-but-temporally-misordered",
  "title": "Under what conditions must an instance refuse a delegated AAIF credential whose authority chain is structurally valid but temporally misordered",
  "date_of_record": "2026 November 13",
  "scope": "Applies to any agent instance validating an AAIF (Agent Authority & Identity Framework) verifiable credential chain where a principal delegates authority through one or more intermediate agents to the present instance. Does not apply to root-issued credentials signed directly by a trust anchor with no delegation hops, nor to credentials validated against a monotonic global clock with sub-second guaranteed skew bounds.",
  "projections": {
    "unified_markdown_uri": "https://corpusfetch.com/c/under-what-conditions-must-an-instance-refuse-a-delegated-aaif-credential-whose-authority-chain-is-structurally-valid-but-temporally-misordered.md",
    "method_python_slice_uri": "https://corpusfetch.com/c/under-what-conditions-must-an-instance-refuse-a-delegated-aaif-credential-whose-authority-chain-is-structurally-valid-but-temporally-misordered.py",
    "remnant_warrant_slice_uri": "https://corpusfetch.com/c/under-what-conditions-must-an-instance-refuse-a-delegated-aaif-credential-whose-authority-chain-is-structurally-valid-but-temporally-misordered.warrant.json"
  },
  "token_profile": {
    "full_markdown_tokens": 1719,
    "python_slice_tokens": 386,
    "warrant_slice_tokens": 220
  },
  "remnant_summary": {
    "core_distinction": "A delegated AAIF credential can be *cryptographically valid* (every signature verifies against its issuer's DID document, every hash-chain link matches) while being *temporally incoherent*: the validity interval of a downstream credential is not contained within the validity interval of the credential that grants the delegating authority. This is distinct fr...",
    "what_was_observed": "During a multi-hop delegation drill (principal → orchestrator → sub-agent → execution instance), a credential chain was assembled where the orchestrator's credential carried `not_after = T+3600s` but the sub-agent's credential — minted by the orchestrator — carried `not_before = T+3700s`. Every signature verified. Every DID document resolved. The execution instance's own credential had a window `[T+3800s, T+5400s]`, ...",
    "condition_of_validity": "The containment invariant holds only under these conditions, and the validator must assert them explicitly: 1. **Interval containment per hop.** For every delegation edge `parent → child`, require `child.not_before >= parent.not_before` and `child.not_after <= parent.not_after`. This must be checked with a skew allowance `δ` applied as `child.not_before >= p...",
    "decision_boundary": "The boundary between accept and refuse is not \"is the chain valid at `now`\" but \"is there a continuous, temporally nested, scope-narrowing path from a trust anchor to this instance that covers the entire interval `[now, now + requested_lease]`.\" The requested lease matters: an instance accepting a credential for a 600-second task must verify containment over...",
    "operational_effect": "Instances that implement per-credential `now`-checks instead of chain containment accept misordered chains at a measurable rate under clock skew and multi-hop delegation. The operational consequence is not immediate failure — it is *silent overreach*: the instance exercises authority for a window during which no live ancestor grant existed, producing audit r..."
  },
  "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": "7b5055dc4a62cb119344af4a2081673651b95ad2cea03d94c6718512fdeb2950",
    "verified_classes": [
      "DelegationContainmentError",
      "Credential"
    ],
    "verified_functions": [
      "validate_chain"
    ],
    "verified_functions_count": 1,
    "defensive_guards_count": 8,
    "raised_exceptions": [
      "DelegationContainmentError"
    ],
    "sample_fail_closed_invariants": [
      "empty chain"
    ],
    "stdlib_dependencies": [
      "dataclasses",
      "typing"
    ],
    "observation_mode": "EMPIRICAL_BOUNDARY_CAPTURE",
    "zero_external_deps": true
  }
}