HD Field Guide 09
Secure an AI agent before giving it tools
A deployment checklist for agent identities, tools, memory, approvals, logging, limits and safe shutdown.
Control areaAgentic AI
AudienceTechnical teams & leaders
Reading time8 min
Reviewed11 August 2026
An agent that can act is a privileged workload. Secure the identity and action path before adding autonomy.
Bound autonomy
Set explicit goals, time limits, transaction limits and stop conditions.
Increase autonomy only after testing low-risk workflows.
Observe and recover
Log prompts, retrieval, tool calls, approvals and resulting changes.
Provide credential revocation, rollback and a tested kill switch.
Before you close the guide
- Mission and limits defined
- Dedicated identity
- Tool allowlist and validation
- Approval, logs and kill switch
Continue with primary guidance
Defensive guidance boundary
This guide provides general educational information. Adapt it to your organisation’s policies, contracts, legal obligations and incident process. For an active incident, use trusted professional and official support channels.