



Dispatch                                                        C. Zheng
Internet-Draft                                                    B. Liu
Intended status: Standards Track                                 N. Geng
Expires: 7 May 2026                                               Q. Gao
                                                                X. Shang
                                                                   Z. Li
                                                     Huawei Technologies
                                                         3 November 2025


                       Agent Identity Managenment
           draft-zheng-dispatch-agent-identity-management-00

Abstract

   This document specifies agent identity management in the Internet of
   Agents (IOA) system.  It defines the descriptive requirements for
   agent identities, the agent registration process, the structure and
   assignment of agent identifiers, and the basic and extended identity
   management functions performed by the agent gateway based on the
   agent's descriptive information.

Status of This Memo

   This Internet-Draft is submitted in full conformance with the
   provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79.

   Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering
   Task Force (IETF).  Note that other groups may also distribute
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   Drafts is at https://datatracker.ietf.org/drafts/current/.

   Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months
   and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any
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   material or to cite them other than as "work in progress."

   This Internet-Draft will expire on 7 May 2026.

Copyright Notice

   Copyright (c) 2025 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
   document authors.  All rights reserved.

   This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
   Provisions Relating to IETF Documents (https://trustee.ietf.org/
   license-info) in effect on the date of publication of this document.
   Please review these documents carefully, as they describe your rights



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   and restrictions with respect to this document.  Code Components
   extracted from this document must include Revised BSD License text as
   described in Section 4.e of the Trust Legal Provisions and are
   provided without warranty as described in the Revised BSD License.

Table of Contents

   1.  Introduction  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   2
     1.1.  Requirements Language . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   3
   2.  Overview of the Agent Identity Management . . . . . . . . . .   3
   3.  Agent description Requirements  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   4
     3.1.  Basic Information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   4
     3.2.  Extended Information  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   6
   4.  Agent Identity Registration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7
   5.  Agent Identity management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7
     5.1.  Agent Identifier  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   8
     5.2.  Agent Identity Basic Managenment  . . . . . . . . . . . .   9
     5.3.  Agent Identity Extended Management  . . . . . . . . . . .  10
   6.  Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  10
   7.  IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  10
   8.  Normative References  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  11
   Authors' Addresses  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  11

1.  Introduction

   As intelligent agents become increasingly prevalent in distributed
   and interoperable systems, robust identity management is essential to
   ensure secure, scalable, and policy-compliant operation.  In the
   Internet of Agents (IOA) system, agents—ranging from simple
   automation scripts to high-intelligence autonomous entities—must be
   uniquely identified, authenticated, and governed throughout their
   lifecycle.

   This document outlines the foundational framework for agent identity
   management in the IOA system.  It specifies the required descriptive
   attributes of an agent, the registration process with the agent
   gateway, the format and semantics of agent identifiers, and the basic
   and extended management capabilities enabled by the agent’s identity
   metadata.  While security mechanisms such as authentication protocols
   and cryptographic binding are acknowledged as critical, their
   detailed specification is considered out of scope for this document.










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1.1.  Requirements Language

   The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
   "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "NOT RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and
   "OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in
   BCP 14 [RFC2119] [RFC8174] when, and only when, they appear in all
   capitals, as shown here.

2.  Overview of the Agent Identity Management

   The agent identity management architecture in the IOA system
   comprises four core functional modules: Agent Description, Agent
   Identity Registration, Agent Identity Management, and Security
   Considerations.  First, an agent's identity information MUST be
   represented in a normalized form.  The agent then registers this
   normalized identity description with an Agent Gateway.  Upon
   successful authentication of the registering agent, the Agent Gateway
   assigns a unique Agent ID to the agent and, using the Agent ID as a
   key, enforces identity management policies based on the agent's
   normalized identity description.































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                  Agent Gateway
                  +-------------------------------------------+
                  |                                           |
                  | +-------------------------------------+   |
        /---------+-|          Identity Management        |<--+----------\
        |         | +++-----------------------------------+   |          |
        |         |  ||   +--------------------------+        |          |
        |         |  ||-->|Agent ID:Basic Managemnt  |        |          |
        |         |  |    +--------------------------+        |          |
        |         |  |   +---------------------------+        |          |
        |         |  |--->|Agent ID:Basic Managemnt  |        |          |
        |         |       +--------------------------+        |          |
        |         +-------------------------------------------+          |
        |                                                                |
        |<----------------Agent Identity Registion---------------------->|
        |                                                                |
        |        Agent                                                   |
        |         +----------------------------+                         |
        |         | +----------------------+   |                         |
        |         | |      Description     |---+-------------------------/
        |         | +++--------------------+   |
        |         |  ||  +-----------------+   |
        |         |  ||->|Basic Information|   |
        |         |  |   +-----------------+   |
        |         |  |   +------------------+  |
        |         |  |-->|Extend Information|  |
        |         |      +------------------+  |
        |         |                            |
        |         |      +-----------------+   |
        \---------+----->|    Agent ID     |   |
                  |      +-----------------+   |
                  +----------------------------+

           Figure 1: Agent identity management architecture

3.  Agent description Requirements

   To enable accurate agent identity management on the agent gateway, it
   is necessary to define a set of essential information elements for
   describing an agent.

3.1.  Basic Information

   The agent description MUST include the following base information
   elements:

   *  Agent name




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   *  Agent capabilities/skills

   *  Agent author

   *  Agent version

   *  Agent creation time

   *  Agent description model version

   *  Agent location

   *  Agent communication protocol

   *  Agent description (human-readable)

   *  Agent signature

   In addition, the following attributes MUST also be included as part
   of the base information:

   *  Agent validity period

   *  Agent form factor

   *  Agent intelligence level

   *  Agent extended profile URI

   *  Agent role

   *  Translation enablement indicator

   Usecases

   *  Agent validity period: The validity period of an agent on the
      agent gateway specifies the time interval during which the agent
      is considered active and authorized for operation.  The agent
      gateway MAY use this field to enforce publication and maintenance
      policies, automatically deactivating or removing expired or stale
      ("zombie") agents to reduce operational overhead and minimize the
      burden of agent lifecycle management.









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   *  Agent form factor: The form of the agent, such as digital agent or
      embodied agent.  The form field can support the interconnection of
      heterogeneous forms of agents in future IOA systems.  For example,
      agent gateways may have different requirements for access
      authentication and policy control for agents of different forms.
      Communication protocols between agents of different forms may also
      differ.

   *  Agent intelligence level: The intelligence level of an agent can
      be defined using mainstream AI agent intelligence classification
      standards in the future.  This will help application agents to
      select the final communication target among a group of candidate
      agents based on the required intelligence level.  For example,
      when agents have the same capabilities, the one with a higher
      intelligence level can be chosen.

   *  Agent extended profile URI: The address accessible for the
      extended version of the agent.  It helps to continuously and
      dynamically upgrade and update the agent during its online period
      on the extended version address.

   *  Agent role: The roles of agents include two types: consumer and
      producer.  An agent can also assume both roles.  This helps the
      agent gateway determine whether to establish a short connection or
      a long connection with the agent.  It also assists the gateway in
      formulating control strategies when publishing agent information
      on the network, for example, by not publishing information for
      consumers who do not provide services.

   *  Translation enablement indicator: This field describes whether the
      agent message allows the gateway to perform message translation.
      It helps the agent gateway to translate heterogeneous protocol
      communications between agents while respecting the agent's
      preferences.  For example, in scenarios where semantic translation
      might occur, the agent can use this field to protect its data
      privacy.

3.2.  Extended Information

   The agent description SHOULD include the following extended
   information elements:

   *  Network requirements

   *  Trust level

   *  Extension




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   Usecases

   *  Network requirements: The requirements of agents for the network
      include three aspects: experience, monitoring, and security.
      These help the agent gateway implement on-demand QoS guarantee
      strategies (e.g., low latency assurance or high bandwidth
      assurance), security assurance strategies (e.g., path security,
      quantum encryption for communication), and agent task monitoring
      and maintenance strategies (e.g., agent task flow measurements at
      the stream level, packet level, segment level, and etc.).

   *  Trust level: The agent's permission scope defines the boundaries
      of its authorized operations and data access.  This attribute
      enables the agent gateway to enforce fine-grained access control
      policies—for example, restricting agent data from leaving a
      specific administrative domain such as a campus or a
      country—thereby supporting regulatory compliance and data
      sovereignty requirements.

   *  Extension: An extensible information field is provided as a
      reserved mechanism to accommodate future dynamic attributes of the
      agent.

4.  Agent Identity Registration

   The agent MUST register its descriptive information with the agent
   gateway to enable the gateway to perform identity management based on
   this description.  The specific registration interaction protocol
   between the agent and the gateway is outside the scope of this draft.

   Upon receiving an agent's registration information, the agent gateway
   MUST first perform identity authentication.  The specific
   authentication mechanism is outside the scope of this document.
   Following successful authentication, the gateway proceeds to the next
   step of agent identity management.

5.  Agent Identity management

   The agent gateway MUST first assign a unique identifier to the agent.
   Using this identifier as a key, the gateway can perform both basic
   and extended identity management functions by correlating it with the
   agent's descriptive information.









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5.1.  Agent Identifier

   The agent identifier (agent ID) is used to uniquely represent an
   agent within the IOA system.  Specific approaches for constructing
   this identifier MAY employ a hierarchical string scheme (e.g.,
   incorporating domain, subdomain, and instance components) or
   alternatively use a standardized encoding of such a hierarchical
   string (e.g., via URI, UUID, or other IETF-recognized identifier
   formats) to ensure global uniqueness, interoperability, and ease of
   parsing.

   Below is an example definition of an agent identifier in the form of
   a hierarchical string:

   orgtype:org/internal enterprise namespace/client-id

   Where:

   *  orgtype indicates the standardized type or schema that the org
      field conforms to.  This enables consistent interpretation and
      validation of the organizational context associated with the
      agent, such as whether the organization is identified according to
      a public registry (e.g., PENs for orgnizations [RFC9371]), or
      another recognized naming authority.

   *  org field identifies the enterprise or organization to which the
      agent belongs, in accordance with the standard specified by the
      orgtype field.This ensures that the organizational identifier is
      interpreted consistently and unambiguously according to the
      referenced naming scheme or registry.

   *  internal enterprise namespace is defined and managed autonomously
      by the enterprise itself.  It provides a private, organization-
      specific naming scheme for identifying agents, organizational
      units, or other entities within the enterprise’s administrative
      domain, without reliance on external registries or global
      standards.

   *  client-id serves as a locally unique identifier for the agent
      within its administrative or operational domain.  It MAY be
      assigned by the agent gateway upon registration, or alternatively
      issued by a Certificate Authority (CA) during the agent identity
      signing process, ensuring uniqueness and cryptographic binding to
      the agent’s identity credentials.







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5.2.  Agent Identity Basic Managenment

   Based on the base information contained in the agent description, the
   agent gateway can perform fundamental identity management functions
   using the agent ID as the primary key.

   Agent ID : Basic Management functions

   These functions include, but are not limited to:

   *  Identity verification management: validating the authenticity and
      integrity of the agent using attributes such as name, signature,
      and author.

   *  Capability classification management: categorizing agents
      according to their declared skills/capabilities for policy-based
      routing or service matching.

   *  Communication protocol management: enforcing or negotiating
      supported communication protocols to ensure interoperability.

   *  Lifecycle management: tracking and controlling the agent’s
      operational state (e.g., creation, activation, expiration,
      revocation) based on attributes such as creation time and validity
      period.

   *  Form factor classification management: grouping agents by their
      form (e.g., embedded, digital) for resource allocation or policy
      application.

   *  Intelligence level management: applying differentiated handling
      policies based on the agent’s declared intelligence level.For
      example, the agent gateway MAY apply behavior monitoring policies
      of varying intensity based on the agent's declared intelligence
      level, thereby preventing high-intelligence agents from performing
      unauthorized or out-of-scope actions.

   *  Extended profile management: referencing and validating the
      agent’s extended profile URI for dynamic or context-specific
      attributes.

   *  Role-based classification management: assigning or enforcing
      permissions and behaviors according to the agent’s declared role.

   *  Communication translation management: enabling or disabling
      protocol or semantic translation based on the translation
      enablement indicator.




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   These management functions collectively support scalable, secure, and
   policy-compliant operation of agents within the IOA system.

5.3.  Agent Identity Extended Management

   By leveraging the extensible information included in the agent
   description, the agent gateway can perform enhanced identity
   management functions beyond the base set.

   Agent ID : Extended Management functions

   These extended management functions include:

   *  Agent network service management: dynamically provisioning,
      monitoring, or orchestrating network services associated with the
      agent (e.g., QoS requirements, connectivity policies, security
      assurance, and etc.).

   *  Agent permission management: enforcing fine-grained, context-aware
      access control policies based on extended permission scopes, such
      as data residency constraints (e.g., "data must not leave the
      campus or country").

   *  Future extensible identity management functions: supporting
      additional identity-related features that may be defined in future
      specifications, such as behavioral attestation, perfermence
      scoring, or integration with decentralized identity frameworks.

   The extensible information field is designed to be forward-
   compatible, enabling the agent gateway to adapt to evolving
   operational, regulatory, or architectural requirements without
   requiring changes to the core agent description model.

6.  Security Considerations

   Security is a critical consideration in agent identity management.
   This includes authenticating and validating the agent’s identity
   during registration, ensuring the integrity and non-repudiation of
   the agent identifier (e.g., to prevent tampering or spoofing), and
   enforcing access control policies for agent onboarding and
   interaction.  However, the specific security mechanisms and detailed
   considerations related to these aspects are outside the scope of this
   document.

7.  IANA Considerations

   TBD




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8.  Normative References

   [RFC2119]  Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
              Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119,
              DOI 10.17487/RFC2119, March 1997,
              <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc2119>.

   [RFC8174]  Leiba, B., "Ambiguity of Uppercase vs Lowercase in RFC
              2119 Key Words", BCP 14, RFC 8174, DOI 10.17487/RFC8174,
              May 2017, <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc8174>.

Authors' Addresses

   Chong Zheng
   Huawei Technologies
   No. 156 Beiqing Road
   Beijing
   China
   Email: zhengchong6@huawei.com


   Bing Liu
   Huawei Technologies
   No. 156 Beiqing Road
   Beijing
   China
   Email: leo.liubing@huawei.com


   Nan Geng
   Huawei Technologies
   No. 156 Beiqing Road
   Beijing
   China
   Email: gengnan@huawei.com


   Qiangzhou Gao
   Huawei Technologies
   No. 156 Beiqing Road
   Beijing
   China
   Email: gaoqiangzhou@huawei.com








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   Xiaotong Shang
   Huawei Technologies
   No. 156 Beiqing Road
   Beijing
   China
   Email: shangxiaotong@huawei.com


   Zhenbin Li
   Huawei Technologies
   No. 156 Beiqing Road
   Beijing
   China
   Email: robinli314@163.com





































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