The Trust-State Standard governs the deterministic conditions under which consequence-bearing digital action becomes admissible, executable, and independently verifiable.
It establishes a pre-execution governance model in which authority, evidence, Rule-State, context, and other governing conditions are evaluated before consequence-bearing execution is permitted to occur.
Layer 0 is Consequence.
Consequence is the foundational condition giving rise to governance. Governance does not create consequence. Governance determines the conditions under which consequence-bearing activity may be permitted to occur.
Identity, access, capability, authority, evidence, Rule-State, admissibility, and execution eligibility operate above Layer 0 as governance conditions applied to consequence-bearing action.
Establishes whether an actor, system, or autonomous agent possesses sufficient authority for a specific proposed action within defined scope, constraints, lineage, time, and revocation state.
Evaluates Authority-State, evidence, Rule-State, context, dependencies, and other governing conditions to determine whether a consequence-bearing action may proceed.
Determines whether an admissible action may cross the execution boundary now, under the governing conditions applicable at the time of execution.
Trust-State does not depend upon trust in the original evaluator.
Where required by the applicable Conformance Profile, governed conditions, determinations, continuity state, and execution eligibility remain identifiable and reproducible so that an independent evaluator can verify, recompute, or replay the resulting determination.
The Standard is technology-neutral and does not require a particular policy engine, identity protocol, cryptographic implementation, artificial intelligence model, distributed ledger, programming language, or execution environment.
Deterministic Admissibility
Determines whether a proposed consequence-bearing action satisfies applicable governing conditions.
Deterministic Enforcement
Determines admissibility and prevents non-eligible actions from crossing the execution boundary.
Deterministic Continuity and Recomputation
Determines, enforces, maintains, and reproduces governed state across material change.
The Trust-State Standard is stewarded and published by VTI Foundation, Inc.
Published releases are version-identifiable and preserved as independent publication artifacts. Supersession does not alter the historical integrity of a prior release.
Conformance and certification remain distinct. Conformance establishes demonstrated satisfaction of applicable normative requirements. Certification is a formal third-party determination regarding that conformity.