Digital Action Receipts
Verifiable, append-only records of digital actions, generated at the moment they occur — designed to be referenced later during audits, disputes, and “what happened?” questions.
// Canonical idea (illustrative, non-prescriptive)
await issueReceipt({
actor: "system|service|agent|user",
action: "access.approved",
object: "resource:payments",
ref: "internal-id-123"
})Records occurrence at the moment an action happens.
Verifies integrity without privileged system access.
Does not explain, judge, or enforce decisions.
Start here
A short set of pages that define the primitive, its boundaries, and how it fits alongside existing systems.
Core invariants
- Generated at the moment of action (not reconstructed later).
- Append-only: previously stored receipts are not modified or removed.
- Verifiable for integrity (unaltered vs mismatch detected).
- Independent of later representation or explanation.
- No correctness, intent, or enforcement claims.
The problem this addresses
- Digital systems rely on logs and narratives to reconstruct events after the fact.
- As automation and agents increase, reconstruction becomes costly and disputed.
- “Who did what, when?” is often unclear across teams, vendors, and systems.
How it works
Action occurs
A digital action executes inside an existing system.
Receipt issued
A neutral receipt is generated at execution time.
Receipt referenced
The identifier is used in tickets, audits, or reports.
Integrity verified
Verification confirms the receipt has not been altered.
Where this shows up first
- Access & identity approvals
- Infrastructure changes & deployments
- Financial authorizations
- Healthcare consent events
- Agent-initiated actions
- Any system requiring post-hoc proof of action
Docs
Contact
If you are evaluating referenceable proof-of-action artifacts for audits, disputes, incident review, or agentic systems, you can reach out for a short technical conversation.