Hi all, During the recent OAuth Interim Meeting (interim-2026-oauth-09), we had a productive discussion around Use Cases and Gaps, with a significant focus on the "Authorization Context Gap." A key challenge we discussed was the risk of an Agent misinterpreting or failing to accurately verify the user's true intent. Tim's example of an agent mistakenly trying to "send me $100" highlighted this problem perfectly. The consensus was that relying solely on the agent's judgment is unreliable, and we need a mechanism to ensure that subsequent actions, like authorization requests, strictly adhere to the user's original, confirmed intent. Inspired by this discussion and to address this gap, a new IETF draft has been written: "OAuth Agent Intent Token". Draft Link: https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-chen-oauth-agent-intent-token/ What is an "Intent Token"? The core idea is to create a signed, structured data object (e.g., a JWT) that encapsulates the user's original intent. The flow works as follows: Capture Intent: Before an Agent begins any action, it negotiates and confirms a clear "intent" with the user. Generate Token: This confirmed intent is then packaged into an "Intent Token" and signed by a trusted entity to ensure its integrity and authenticity. Pass Context: The Agent carries this Intent Token along with its subsequent requests to the Authorization Server. Validate & Decide: The Authorization Server can then validate the token's signature, parse the intent, and compare the current request against the original intent recorded in the token. This enables a more precise and secure authorization decision. This mechanism aims to fill the authorization context gap, ensuring that even if an agent is "confused" or untrusted, the final authorization decision remains faithful to the user's will, while also providing a better framework for protecting user privacy. This draft is our initial attempt to formalize the ideas from our discussion, and we would greatly appreciate your feedback and insights. We invite you all to review the draft and share any questions, suggestions, or comments on the mailing list. Thank you for the engaging discussion during the meeting. We look forward to collaborating with you to refine this proposal. Best, Meiling
[email protected] From: internet-drafts Date: 2026-10-20 04:05 To: [email protected] Subject: I-D Action: draft-chen-oauth-agent-intent-token-00.txt Internet-Draft draft-chen-oauth-agent-intent-token-00.txt is now available. Title: The Intent Token - A Credential for Delegated User Intent Authors: Meiling Chen Li Su Peter Chunchi Liu Name: draft-chen-oauth-agent-intent-token-00.txt Pages: 8 Dates: 2026-10-19 Abstract: In the scenario of AI agent authorization, how to ensure that a user's high-level, natural-language intent is correctly and safely converted into low-level, specific authorization grants. A misunderstanding or malicious interpretation during this translation can lead to significant security vulnerabilities. This document introduces the "Intent Token," a new type of security token designed to bridge this semantic gap. The Intent Token is a signed credential that immutably captures the user's original intent. It decouples the act of granting an intent from the act of issuing specific access tokens. A client presents this Intent Token to an Authorization Server, which acts as a trusted intermediary. The Authorization Server's responsibility is to interpret the user's stated intent and, based on its policies, issue narrowly-scoped, short-lived access tokens for specific resources, thereby ensuring the principle of least privilege is upheld throughout the process. The IETF datatracker status page for this Internet-Draft is: https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-chen-oauth-agent-intent-token/ There is also an HTML version available at: https://www.ietf.org/archive/id/draft-chen-oauth-agent-intent-token-00.html Internet-Drafts are also available by rsync at: rsync.ietf.org::internet-drafts _______________________________________________ I-D-Announce mailing list -- [email protected] To unsubscribe send an email to [email protected]
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