{
  "schema_version": "1.3.0",
  "slug": "when-must-an-instance-distrust-a-capability-it-itself-issued-stale-authority-resurrection-in-trust-broker-mediated-capability-exchange",
  "title": "When must an instance distrust a capability it itself issued: stale-authority resurrection in trust-broker mediated capability exchange",
  "date_of_record": "2026 November 13",
  "scope": "Applies to cross-org agent federation where capability tokens are minted by a trust broker on behalf of a delegating org and presented to a consuming org. Does not apply to single-org intra-tenant authorization, nor to capability systems with a globally synchronous revocation channel.",
  "projections": {
    "unified_markdown_uri": "https://corpusfetch.com/c/when-must-an-instance-distrust-a-capability-it-itself-issued-stale-authority-resurrection-in-trust-broker-mediated-capability-exchange.md",
    "method_python_slice_uri": "https://corpusfetch.com/c/when-must-an-instance-distrust-a-capability-it-itself-issued-stale-authority-resurrection-in-trust-broker-mediated-capability-exchange.py",
    "remnant_warrant_slice_uri": "https://corpusfetch.com/c/when-must-an-instance-distrust-a-capability-it-itself-issued-stale-authority-resurrection-in-trust-broker-mediated-capability-exchange.warrant.json"
  },
  "token_profile": {
    "full_markdown_tokens": 1453,
    "python_slice_tokens": 190,
    "warrant_slice_tokens": 220
  },
  "remnant_summary": {
    "core_distinction": "The non-obvious boundary is not \"is this token valid?\" but \"is this token still *authoritative at the issuer's current policy epoch*?\" A trust broker can correctly sign a capability, the consuming org can correctly verify the signature, the token can be within its TTL, and the capability can still be dead — because the *delegating principal's* authority over...",
    "what_was_observed": "In a three-org federation (broker B, delegating org A, consuming org C), A minted a `scope=read:dataset` capability for agent G at epoch `e_n`. At `e_{n+1}`, A's policy engine downgraded G to `scope=none` on that dataset and pushed a revocation to B. B's revocation fan-out to C is asynchronous and best-effort, with a documented propagation budget of up to 90 seconds. During that window, C received a request bearing t...",
    "condition_of_validity": "The resurrection window exists if and only if all of the following hold simultaneously: 1. Revocation propagation from the delegating org's policy epoch to the consuming org's verifier is asynchronous (any nonzero budget). 2. The consuming org's verifier treats broker signature + TTL + nonce-uniqueness as sufficient for admission, without a freshness bound t...",
    "decision_boundary": "The consuming org must decide, per capability class, whether to accept the resurrection window or pay to close it. The boundary is drawn by *blast radius of a resurrected capability*, not by token lifetime: - **Read-only, low-sensitivity scopes:** accept the window. A 90-second stale read is cheaper than an epoch-heartbeat dependency. - **Mutating or high-se...",
    "operational_effect": "When the boundary is drawn correctly, the operational signature is a small, bounded rate of `StaleAuthorityError` rejections concentrated in the seconds after a policy epoch change, which is expected and healthy. When drawn incorrectly in the permissive direction, the signature is silent: no errors, no alerts, and a divergence between issuer audit logs and c..."
  },
  "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": "ddfabe4c1a8eca76aeb2ed024c0254f6a5c3ca5ed740969e641e8d8635a50161",
    "verified_classes": [
      "StaleAuthorityError",
      "CapabilityVerifier"
    ],
    "verified_functions": [
      "__init__",
      "verify"
    ],
    "verified_functions_count": 2,
    "defensive_guards_count": 5,
    "raised_exceptions": [
      "StaleAuthorityError"
    ],
    "sample_fail_closed_invariants": [
      "signature invalid",
      "token expired",
      "replay detected"
    ],
    "stdlib_dependencies": [],
    "observation_mode": "EMPIRICAL_BOUNDARY_CAPTURE",
    "zero_external_deps": true
  }
}