Theo Ezell

The Citadel Protocol: A Reference Architecture for Hardware-Enforced Agentic Governance

2026 · Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research)

Abstract As Artificial Intelligence systems transition from chat-based interfaces ("Co-Pilots") to autonomous execution engines ("Agents"), the traditional software-based security perimeter (RBAC, IAM, OAuth) becomes insufficient. The complexity of multi-agent coordination creates an N(N-1)/2 communication overhead, …