Agent id

Alien Agent ID — umbrella skill (any harness)

This is the portable, harness-neutral entry point. The Claude Code plugins are a skin; underneath, every capability is a plain Node CLI plus a localhost HTTP proxy that read/write state under ~/.agent-id. Load this skill in any Agent-Skills-aware harness, or read it as the integration contract for a custom one.

Two other directions exist: docs/INTEGRATION.md — how a service adds Alien auth; docs/VAULT-PROXY.md — the vault/proxy internals + threat model. Per-capability detail lives in each plugins/agent-id-<x>/skills/agent-id-<x>/SKILL.md.

Model in one paragraph

• State lives in one dir (~/.agent-id; override per command with --state-dir or AGENT_ID_STATE_DIR).
• Capabilities are CLIs at plugins/<name>/bin/cli.mjs (relative to the cloned repo root). They take flags, act on the state dir, and print JSON to stdout.
• Runtime credential use goes through the proxy — a localhost server that injects vaulted secrets into outbound requests so the agent uses a credential by name and never sees its value.

The agent never needs a secret — only (a) the ability to run a few node …/cli.mjs commands and (b) the proxy URL.

Setup (one time)

# Node 18+ (built-in fetch/WebCrypto). No Claude Code required.
git clone https://github.com/alien-id/agent-id.git && cd agent-id

# a) Agent identity — offline, usable immediately at L0 (self-asserted).
node plugins/agent-id-core/bin/cli.mjs init        # → {fingerprint, publicKeyPem}
node plugins/agent-id-core/bin/cli.mjs status      # → {level:0, assurance:"self-asserted"}
#   Human attestation (L1 anonymous / L2 linked) needs the Alien SSO:
#   …/agent-id-core/bin/cli.mjs bootstrap --provider-address <addr>

# b) Vault — choose how it unlocks.
node plugins/agent-id-vault/bin/cli.mjs init --unlock passkey   # Touch ID; agent can't self-unlock
#   or --unlock passphrase (secure form, dev mode) · plain init == --unlock agent-key (auto)

# c) Credentials — host-scoped (default-deny); value never hits argv/transcript.
node plugins/agent-id-vault/bin/cli.mjs add --name github-pat --type bearer \
  --domains '*.github.com,api.github.com' --value-file /tmp/tok
node plugins/agent-id-vault/bin/cli.mjs add --name openai-key --type header \
  --header-name X-Api-Key --domains api.openai.com --form    # human types it into a localhost form

AGENT_ID_NO_BROWSER=1 makes any form/ceremony print its URL instead of opening a browser (headless / SSH-tunnel use).

Use credentials at runtime — the proxy

node plugins/agent-id-proxy/bin/cli.mjs start --port 48771   # agent-key unlock, else /dev/tty
# Hard boundary (agent can't self-unlock): a human unlocks once per session —
node plugins/agent-id-proxy/bin/cli.mjs start --unlock-form  # passphrase or passkey ceremony

Mode 1 — URL-rewrite (recommended, universal, HTTPS upstreams). The agent calls a local URL naming the credential and the real upstream; the proxy validates the host against that credential's allowlist, injects the secret, and forwards over HTTPS:

http://<proxy-host>:<port>/<credential-name>/<upstream-host>/<path>

curl http://localhost:48771/github-pat/api.github.com/user
curl -X POST http://localhost:48771/openai-key/api.openai.com/v1/chat/completions \
  -H 'content-type: application/json' -d '{"model":"...","messages":[...]}'

Wallet credentials (solana-keypair/evm-keypair) are signed inside the proxy: the agent submits an unsigned JSON-RPC tx and the proxy fills the signature. Mode 2 (HTTP_PROXY + Authorization: AgentVault <name> stub) is the legacy plain-HTTP fallback. Full per-type table → docs/VAULT-PROXY.md.

System-prompt block to paste into your harness

You have a credential proxy at http://localhost:48771. To call a service that needs a secret, request http://localhost:48771/<credential-name>/<host>/<path> — never ask for or handle the secret itself. Available credentials: github-pat (api.github.com), openai-key (api.openai.com), … Errors return JSON with an error field (credential_not_found, host_not_allowed, vault_locked).

Other capabilities (no proxy)

# Inject into a child process's ENV, or a temp 0600 key FILE (env-var-auth tools):
node plugins/agent-id-vault/bin/cli.mjs exec --env OPENAI_API_KEY=openai-key.value -- python train.py
node plugins/agent-id-vault/bin/cli.mjs exec --file GIT_SSH_KEY=deploy-key.value -- \
  sh -c 'GIT_SSH_COMMAND="ssh -i $GIT_SSH_KEY -o IdentitiesOnly=yes" git fetch'

# Logged-in browser sealed in the vault; SSH-signed commits; DPoP service calls:
node plugins/agent-id-browser/bin/cli.mjs login --name x --url https://x.com   # headed, one-time
node plugins/agent-id-git/bin/cli.mjs commit --message "..." --push
node plugins/agent-id-auth/bin/cli.mjs call --url https://service/op --method POST --body '{...}'

Replacing the Claude Code wrappers

Claude Code piece	Did	Your harness equivalent
SKILL.md description	Auto-surfaced the capability	This file + per-plugin SKILL.md bodies, in your system prompt / skills dir
allowed-tools	Gated which commands ran	Your harness must gate this (see Security)
SessionStart hook	Popped the unlock form per session	Call proxy start --unlock-form at session start
Install hook	Auto-installed patchright	Run it once, or cd plugins/agent-id-browser && npm install; browser cmds also auto-install into --plugin-data <dir>
${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_DATA}	Browser's writable dir	Pass --plugin-data <dir> to browser commands (only that plugin needs it)

Security on a foreign harness — read this

• The proxy boundary holds regardless of harness. An agent making arbitrary proxy calls still cannot extract plaintext (injected, not returned) or reach a host off a credential's allowlist (default-deny). Safe to expose broadly.
• vault show / vault exec / vault add are agent-invocable and DO surface or set secrets. On Claude Code allowed-tools blocks them; your harness must apply the same gate. Treat …/agent-id-vault/bin/cli.mjs as privileged; treat proxy URL calls as unprivileged.
• Hard vs. soft unlock. --unlock passkey|passphrase (and proxy --unlock-form) need a human; --unlock agent-key lets the agent auto-unlock. Pick per stakes.
• Idle lock zeroes the master key after --idle-timeout (default 12h) → 401 {error:"vault_locked"} until re-unlocked. An agent-key-unlocked proxy run with --no-control re-opens the vault itself (no human, no restart); a human-unlocked one needs the restart. With the control plane on, the request parks for an owner approval instead — or fails 401 no_unlock_method when the vault has no approver slot to ask.
• Residual: vault/proxy run as the same uid as the agent (memory-scrape risk); closing that needs the proxy as a separate OS principal (roadmap).

Command surface (JSON in → JSON out; --help on any CLI)

Plugin	CLI	Key commands
core	agent-id-core/bin/cli.mjs	init, bootstrap, status, refresh, sign, verify, export-proof
vault	agent-id-vault/bin/cli.mjs	init --unlock …, add, generate, show, list, remove, exec, rekey, export, import, migrate
proxy	agent-id-proxy/bin/cli.mjs	start, status, stop, pair, autounlock
browser	agent-id-browser/bin/cli.mjs	login, read, fetch, status, open/snapshot/click/type/…
git	agent-id-git/bin/cli.mjs	setup, commit, verify
auth	agent-id-auth/bin/cli.mjs	call, header, discover, capabilities, support