microsoftSecurity & privacy

Agent Governance Toolkit

agent-governance-toolkit

A governance toolkit for AI agents that adds policy checks, identity, audit trails, sandboxing, and SRE controls across multiple agent frameworks.

  • Security
  • Backend
  • DevOps
  • Automation
  • Monitoring / Observability
  • CLI
  • Library/framework
  • IDE plugin
  • Self-hostable
  • Runs locally
  • Docker supported
agent-governance-toolkit screenshot
Popularity
6.4k Stars
GitHub stars
Recent activity
10/1/2026
Updated in the last 30 days
License
MIT
Permissive

Why it matters

We look beyond stars: what problem it solves, whether it creates real utility, and what makes its approach worth noticing.

Last 90 days

Problem

AI agents acting autonomously in production lack deterministic control over tool calls and data access, as prompt safety and basic IAM scopes cannot prevent destructive tool execution or satisfy audit requirements.

Practical value

Provides an application-layer governance kernel that intercepts tool calls deterministically via YAML policies before execution, supporting Python, TypeScript, .NET, Rust, and Go.

Innovation / differentiation

Shifts defense from prompt-level safety requests to deterministic code-level interception, making policy violations structurally impossible rather than merely unlikely.

Leverage potential

Enables rapid integration of policy checks, identities, and sandboxing into existing agent frameworks via lightweight function wrappers or client SDKs.

Why now

Aligns with the urgent industry push to move autonomous AI agents into production while meeting strict compliance and security auditing demands.

Community activity

In the last 90 days there were 144 new issues and 781 pull requests; the bounded issue/PR samples include 34 issue authors and 21 PR contributors, with 0 releases.

Maintainer responsiveness

The 100-issue window sample had a 75% close rate, and the 98-pull-request sample had a 69% merge rate. Maintainer-comment observations covered only 15% of that issue sample, so response rate and first-response speed are not reported.

21 contributors in PR sample0 releasesPR merge rate 69% · 98 sampled in window

Key highlights

  • Evaluate policy before tool calls, messages, and delegations reach their targets
  • Support allow, deny, approval, and auditable decision records
  • Add identity, trust, runtime sandboxing, SRE, compliance, and MCP security components

Quick start

How it is installed, how hard it is, and where to start.

Where it runs

Runs locally

Difficulty

Medium — some setup needed

Docker supportedSelf-hostableRuns locally
  1. 01Prepare Python 3.11+ and install the full Python toolkit with pip install "agent-governance-toolkit[full]".
  2. 02Run agt doctor to check the installation, then write a YAML policy for the actions that need governance.
  3. 03Wrap tool functions with govern() and verify the allow, deny, and approval paths.
  4. 04Before production, add audit, identity, container isolation, SRE, or MCP security components according to the risk profile.

Best for

  • Teams that want data on their own servers
  • Developers who want to try it on their machine
  • People who prefer Docker deploys

Watch outs

  • 2 inferred from materials — review under Sources below

More about it

Microsoft Agent Governance Toolkit (AGT) places agent tool calls, message sends, and delegations behind deterministic application-level policy checks. In the simplest Python flow, govern() wraps a tool function and evaluates a YAML policy before execution, allowing the host to permit, deny, or require approval while recording the decision.

The project expands into identity and trust, execution sandboxing, audit and compliance, SRE and kill switches, an MCP Security Gateway, and related governance components. SDKs are available for Python, TypeScript, .NET, Rust, and Go, with integrations for agent frameworks and developer surfaces such as Claude Code. The agt CLI covers installation checks, policy linting, compliance verification, and security-oriented validation.

The README explicitly labels the current release as Public Preview and warns that breaking changes may occur before GA. It also states that governance runs at the application middleware layer rather than providing OS-level isolation; separate containers are still recommended for production agent isolation.

Sources

Each field shows its status and source — expand to review.

14 · Expand
  • capability tags

    Verified

    security, automation, monitoring

    Source: manual_curated · Manually curated from the verified project README; no AI draft. · 8/17/2026

  • editor note

    Verified

    {"en":"AGT addresses the layer after a model decides to use a tool: deterministic enforcement and audit before the action reaches the target, rather than another safety prompt. It is relevant once agents touch real data or write-capable tools, but the Public Preview status means integrations should allow for API change.","zh":"AGT 解决的是“模型已经决定要调用工具以后,谁来做确定性拦截和审计”这一层问题,而不是再加一段安全 Prompt。它适合开始把 Agent 接入真实数据和写操作的团队,但当前仍是 Public Preview,接口稳定性要留余量。"}

    Source: manual_curated · Manually curated from the verified project README; no AI draft. · 8/17/2026

  • how to use

    Verified

    {"steps":[{"en":"Prepare Python 3.11+ and install the full Python toolkit with `pip install \"agent-governance-toolkit[full]\"`.","zh":"准备 Python 3.11+,执行 `pip install \"agent-governance-toolkit[full]\"` 安装完整 Python 工具包。"},{"en":"Run `agt doctor` to check the installation, then write a YAML policy for the actions that need governance.","zh":"先运行 `agt doctor` 检查安装,再为需要治理的操作编写 YAML 策略。"},{"en":"Wrap tool functions with `govern()` and verify the allow, deny, and approval paths.","zh":"用 `govern()` 包装工具函数,验证允许、拒绝和审批路径是否符合预期。"},{"en":"Before production, add audit, identity, container isolation, SRE, or MCP security components according to the risk profile.","zh":"进入生产前再按风险需要增加审计、身份、容器隔离、SRE 或 MCP 安全组件。"}],"installAt":"local","difficulty":"medium"}

    Source: manual_curated · Manually curated from the verified project README; no AI draft. · 8/17/2026

  • intro

    Verified

    {"en":"Microsoft Agent Governance Toolkit (AGT) places agent tool calls, message sends, and delegations behind deterministic application-level policy checks. In the simplest Python flow, `govern()` wraps a tool function and evaluates a YAML policy before execution, allowing the host to permit, deny, or require approval while recording the decision.\n\nThe project expands into identity and trust, execution sandboxing, audit and compliance, SRE and kill switches, an MCP Security Gateway, and related governance components. SDKs are available for Python, TypeScript, .NET, Rust, and Go, with integrations for agent frameworks and developer surfaces such as Claude Code. The `agt` CLI covers installation checks, policy linting, compliance verification, and security-oriented validation.\n\nThe README explicitly labels the current release as Public Preview and warns that breaking changes may occur before GA. It also states that governance runs at the application middleware layer rather than providing OS-level isolation; separate containers are still recommended for production agent isolation.","zh":"Microsoft Agent Governance Toolkit(AGT)把 Agent 的工具调用、消息发送和委派操作放在确定性的应用层策略检查之后执行。最简单的 Python 用法可以用 `govern()` 包装一个工具函数,再通过 YAML 策略决定允许、拒绝或要求审批,并记录策略判定。\n\n项目进一步提供身份与信任、执行沙箱、审计与合规、SRE/kill switch、MCP Security Gateway 等组件,并有 Python、TypeScript、.NET、Rust 和 Go SDK,以及 Claude Code 等开发工具的接入方式。它也提供 `agt` CLI 用于安装检查、策略校验、合规验证和安全测试。\n\n当前 README 明确标注为 Public Preview,并提醒 GA 前可能有 breaking changes;同时文档说明治理发生在应用中间件层,并不等同于操作系统级隔离。生产环境仍建议将不同 Agent 放入独立容器。"}

    Source: manual_curated · Manually curated from the verified project README; no AI draft. · 8/17/2026

  • Latest release

    Verified

    v4.1.0

    Source: GitHub API · latest_release=v4.1.0 · 10/1/2026

  • License

    Verified

    MIT

    Source: GitHub API · license.spdx_id=MIT · 10/1/2026

  • needs api key

    Verified

    No

    Source: manual_curated · Manually curated from the verified project README; no AI draft. · 8/17/2026

  • One-liner

    Verified

    {"en":"A governance toolkit for AI agents that adds policy checks, identity, audit trails, sandboxing, and SRE controls across multiple agent frameworks.","zh":"为 AI Agent 工具调用加入策略检查、身份、审计、沙箱与 SRE 控制的治理工具包,可接入多种 Agent 框架。"}

    Source: manual_curated · Manually curated from the verified project README; no AI draft. · 8/17/2026

  • Category hint

    Inferred from materials

    ai-apps

    Source: Project README · hint=ai-apps · 8/13/2026

  • product forms

    Verified

    cli, library_framework, ide_plugin

    Source: manual_curated · Manually curated from the verified project README; no AI draft. · 8/17/2026

  • role tags

    Verified

    security, backend, devops

    Source: manual_curated · Manually curated from the verified project README; no AI draft. · 8/17/2026

  • supports docker

    Verified

    Yes

    Source: Repository file · dockerfile=true; compose=true · 10/1/2026

  • supports local

    Verified

    Yes

    Source: manual_curated · Manually curated from the verified project README; no AI draft. · 8/17/2026

  • supports self host

    Inferred from materials

    Yes

    Source: Project README · matched self-host keywords · 8/13/2026

Other verified projects matched by category, capabilities, and intended roles.