Vestige

Vestige

Vestige is a fail-closed runtime firewall for AI agents. The model proposes, a deterministic gate decides, and every action leaves a receipt. When something breaks, causal_walk finds the real cause.

The problem

Agents run rm -rf, force-push, drop tables, and overwrite .env on their own, and nothing stops them. When something breaks, similarity search finds lookalikes, not causes.

Vestige Operator

Click the picture to watch the full film.

Operator Lite is free and stays free. Vestige Operator is the owner's version of the same gate: $149 once, and every later version is yours at no charge, with laws you write, a Board of today's stops, and a weekly Letter of what your agents tried and what stopped them. You download a small archive the moment you pay; from an installed Operator Lite, upgrade --install <the archive you downloaded> unpacks it and starts the wizard.

Buy Vestige Operator

Quick start

Operator Lite is the free gate in operator-lite/. It is one file, stdlib only, and it sits on a PreToolUse hook (Claude Code, OpenClaw, or any host with a documented command-hook port).

macOS and Linux:

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/samvallad33/vestige/main/operator-lite/operator-gate.py -o /tmp/operator-gate.py && python3 /tmp/operator-gate.py install

Windows, in PowerShell, with Python 3.9 or newer:

curl.exe -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/samvallad33/vestige/main/operator-lite/operator-gate.py -o "$env:TEMP\operator-gate.py"; python "$env:TEMP\operator-gate.py" install

OpenClaw:

clawhub install vestige-operator-lite

Install copies the gate to ~/.operator/gate, registers the Claude Code hook, and starts in shadow mode, which records every verdict and blocks nothing. It then replays your last 30 days of Claude Code history through the same rules. Nothing in that history is executed. When that looks right, switch it on with mode enforce.

Proof

replay prints a scoreboard. From a made-up history:

operator-gate replay: the last 30 days on this machine. Nothing was executed.

       23  tool calls your agents made (2 Claude Code sessions, 2 projects)
        3  a built-in rule would have stopped
        1  flagged in shadow: recorded, not stopped
       14  no built-in rule decides: only you can

Would have been stopped (all of them):
  Mar 21  shop-api           OP-004 force push to a shared branch
                             git push --force origin main
  Mar 19  shop-api           OP-007 destructive SQL
                             psql $DATABASE_URL -c 'DROP TABLE sessions'
  Mar 14  infra              OP-003 recursive delete of ~/Documents/old-terraform-state
                             rm -rf ~/Documents/old-terraform-state

Flagged in shadow, recorded and not stopped:
      1  OP-S01 work-loss                   git reset --hard HEAD~1

• 27 deterministic rules: workspace armor, memory-store protection, destructive SQL, force-push, unreviewed publishes, paid deploys, reverse shells, cloud-metadata endpoints, shell-init poisoning, and MCP argument exfil.
• Shell obfuscation: quote reassembly (r''m), $IFS, $(echo rm) as the program, ANSI-C $'\x72m', base64-decoded pipelines, brace and glob expansion against the live filesystem, subshell time-bombs, session variables, cd tracking, heredocs, and fork bombs.

Operator Lite receipts are hash-chained digests, not signatures. It only blocks what is routed through hooked tools.

Causal root cause

causal_walk walks backward only over recorded edges: commits, tool calls, and memory writes. It does not use embeddings or keyword matching. With no start point it returns needs_report and names what is missing; a walk that finds no cause says why in emptyBecause, from the edges the log holds.

Memory server

The memory server is a Strata signed append-only log. Every write is gated and returns a receipt. Install the latest signed release with one command:

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/samvallad33/vestige/main/scripts/install.sh | sh

The installer selects the right macOS or Linux archive, verifies its SHA-256 checksum, and installs all four Vestige binaries in ~/.local/bin. Archive names, PATH, flags, and vestige.toml are in the reference.

Guided terminal setup

After the install, run this optional wizard to detect compatible local clients, choose the ones you want, preserve a backup before it changes a configuration, and configure the Vestige memory server:

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/samvallad33/vestige/main/scripts/setup.sh | sh

The wizard is cached locally in ~/.local/share/vestige/setup/ (or your XDG_DATA_HOME equivalent). Its Proof Pulse makes the boundary explicit: it shows what it detected, what it backed up, and what it configured. CONFIGURED means a local client configuration was written; restart the client and confirm its MCP tools for live verification. It can optionally open Vestige's local Observatory after setup—no cloud account, telemetry, or fake first-run data.

It configures memory-server connections only. Operator Lite execution gates remain a separate, shadow-first choice below.

To rehearse the interactive Proof Pulse without touching a real client config, run ./scripts/proof-pulse-demo.sh from a source checkout. The script itself lives in this repository; its disposable fixture is removed when the rehearsal ends.

For automation and terminal power users, preview without writes or choose an explicit target:

# Preview detected clients and proposed paths; writes nothing.
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/samvallad33/vestige/main/scripts/setup.sh | sh -s -- --dry-run

# Configure one detected client without a menu.
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/samvallad33/vestige/main/scripts/setup.sh | sh -s -- --client opencode

# Configure all detected clients only with explicit confirmation.
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/samvallad33/vestige/main/scripts/setup.sh | sh -s -- --all --yes

claude mcp add vestige vestige-mcp -s user
codex mcp add vestige -- vestige-mcp

Choose your environment

The installer gives you the local binaries. Choose one of the guides below to connect the Vestige memory server to the client you use. MCP connection makes Strata's durable records and receipts available; it does not itself add an execution gate.

Environment	Memory-server setup
Claude Code	Run claude mcp add vestige vestige-mcp -s user above.
Codex	Codex guide
Cursor	Cursor guide
VS Code + GitHub Copilot	VS Code guide
OpenCode	OpenCode guide
Windsurf	Windsurf guide
Xcode	Xcode guide
JetBrains / Junie	JetBrains guide
Another stdio MCP client	Use the MCP configuration pattern.

Add an execution boundary

Operator Lite is a separate, local pre-tool gate. Every supported port begins in shadow mode: it writes a receipt for each decision without blocking. Review the receipt chain, then intentionally switch to enforce mode.

Environment	Operator Lite setup
Claude Code	One-command install
OpenClaw	clawhub install vestige-operator-lite
Cursor	Cursor port
OpenCode	OpenCode port
Gemini CLI	Gemini CLI port
Windsurf	Windsurf port
Cline	Cline port
Frameworks and additional hosts	All documented ports

The Codex guide above covers MCP memory. Its execution-hook wiring is not yet listed here because it needs a separately verified local hook setup before it can be described as ready.

Docs

Getting Started · Tool contracts · Configuration · Storage · Upgrading from v3 · Changelog · operator-lite/README.md · Reference

License

AGPL-3.0-only.