Four KYE Autonomy Tiers™. One runtime-control floor at each step.
EC-Council ADG names three autonomy tiers (HITL / HOTL / HOOTL). KYE Autonomy Tiers™ compresses those into a sharper four-tier ladder so the runtime-control floor at each step is unambiguous: A0 Human-only · A1 Assist · A2 Scoped delegation · A3 Autonomous with Authority Finality™. Each tier names the KAC™ controls and the evidence schemas that MUST be operating for an action to be admissible at that tier. The canonical set lives at public/examples/autonomy-tiers/canonical-tiers.json.
A0 → A1 → A2 → A3 — sequenced, not parallel.
Each rung declares the runtime-control floor that must be operating for an action to be admissible at that tier. Authorised actions climb; refused or de-escalated actions slide back down.
Which controls must be operating at which tier.
Twelve controls, four tiers. The runtime checks the row for your declared tier and denies any action whose control is not operating.
| Control | A0 | A1 | A2 | A3 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| KAC™-1 Entity Registry | — | required | required | required |
| KAC™-2 Delegation Envelope™ | — | — | required | required |
| KAC™-3 Chain of Authority Map | — | — | — | required |
| KAC™-4 Tool & MCP Authority Register | — | — | required | required |
| KAC™-5 Action Admissibility™ Gate | — | — | required | required |
| KAC™-6 Runtime Policy Resolution | — | — | required | required |
| KAC™-7 Evidence Capture at T=0 | — | — | required | required |
| KAC™-8 Replay Proof | — | — | required | required |
| KAC™-9 Authority Finality™ Record | — | — | — | required (A3 floor) |
| KAC™-10 Revocation and Expiry Control | — | — | required | required |
| KAC™-11 Human Oversight and Escalation | — | — | required | required |
| KAC™-12 KYE Seal™ — Assurance Record | — | — | required | required |
HITL / HOTL / HOOTL ↔ A0 / A1 / A2 / A3
An operator who already uses the ADG oversight vocabulary maps it onto the ladder without re-classifying a single agent.
- HITL ↔ A1 / lower-A2. Human-in-the-loop on every decision. KYE™ optional at A1; KYE™ required from A2 upward.
- HOTL ↔ upper-A2. Human-on-the-loop — approver on-call for critical-point reviews. KAC™-11 is the runtime gate that lifts the right action at the right moment.
- HOOTL ↔ A3. Human-out-of-the-loop except for declared exceptions. Authority Finality™ (KAC™-9) is the A3 floor — the action's chain is provably terminal before the supervisor learns it happened.
Pick the tier. The control floor follows.
An agent deployment declares its tier; the runtime refuses to admit any action that requires a control the tier does not have. Honest by construction.