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Governance Evidence Pack Standard

Purpose#

Describe a portable evidence pack manifest: a set of artifact references (by artifact_id and content_digest), a deterministic digest manifest, and an optional run_id tying the pack to a GovAI evidence run. This supports AI Act–oriented evidence packaging, CI artefact binding narratives, and cross-vendor exchange without embedding binary payloads in JSON.

CI and hosted gates: Customer CI typically materializes evidence_digest_manifest.json plus <run_id>.json, submits events with govai submit-evidence-pack, then verifies digests against GET /bundle-hash with govai verify-evidence-pack (github-action.md). This standard describes the portable pack JSON validators; the govai evidence-pack init CLI scaffolds a minimal customer pack layout—see cli-reference.md.

Export pipeline

From run_id to verifiable audit artefacts for buyers and regulators.

Canonical fields#

Field	Type	Description
`schema_version`	string	Required.
`pack_id`	string	Required.
`tenant_scope`	string	Required.
`run_id`	string	Optional. Correlates with GovAI `run_id` when used together.
`artifacts`	array	Required, non-empty.
`digest_manifest`	object	Required. See below.
`pack_digest`	string	Optional. If present, must match canonical digest of the pack preimage (excluding `pack_digest`).

Each artifact:

Field	Type	Description
`artifact_id`	string	Required. Unique in the pack.
`artifact_type`	string	Required. Opaque type label (for example `capability_policy`).
`uri`	string	Optional. Retrieval hint only; validators do not fetch.
`content_digest`	string	Required. `sha256:` + 64 hex or 64 hex digits (normalized internally).
`evidence_type`	string	Required. `GOVERNED` or `REFERENCE`.
`control_refs`	array of string	Required for `GOVERNED`: must be non-empty. May be empty for `REFERENCE`.
`ai_act_refs`	array of string	Optional; entries must be non-empty strings when present.

digest_manifest:

{
  "entries": [
    { "artifact_id": "...", "content_digest": "sha256:..." }
  ]
}

Entries must match the canonical manifest derived from artifacts (same pairs, sorted by artifact_id).

Validation rules#

Banned raw content keys are rejected.
artifact_id unique; content_digest must be a valid digest token.
GOVERNED artifacts must have non-empty control_refs.
digest_manifest must be exactly the canonical manifest implied by artifacts (sorting and digest normalization), ensuring deterministic manifests.
When pack_digest is set, it must match the digest of the pack preimage (excluding pack_digest).

Digest rules#

digest_manifest canonical form sorts entries by (artifact_id, content_digest).
pack_digest is canonical_digest over the pack preimage including canonical digest_manifest and sorted artifacts (by artifact_id).

Example JSON#

See examples/standards/governance_evidence_pack.valid.json.

CLI usage#

python -m aigov_py.standards.cli validate-evidence-pack path/to/pack.json
python -m aigov_py.standards.cli digest evidence-pack path/to/pack.json

Relationship to GovAI runtime and Phase 4#

Aligns with digest-first patterns used elsewhere in GovAI (for example artefact-bound CI flows and Phase 4 signing envelope planning) but does not write to the ledger or change export APIs.
run_id is optional metadata for correlation with GET /compliance-summary and exports when operators choose to link them.

Non-goals#

No embedding of evidence file bytes or transcripts.
No verification that content_digest matches external bytes (operators use separate tooling).
No Stripe, billing, or tenant identity changes.

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