Changelog¶

Notable changes to the H2A protocol — spec, schemas, reference, and site. H2A is a v0.x working draft, so entries are dated rather than version-tagged; per-document versions (e.g. SPEC-CORE v0.2) are noted where they change. New changes go at the top, under the current date. Format loosely follows Keep a Changelog.

2026-08-06¶

ADR-014 — canonical form and signature encoding (normative)¶

• ADR-014 is Accepted. RFC 8785 JCS is the normative canonical form for every H2A signature and hash, and alg: "ES256" denotes the JOSE fixed-width raw R‖S encoding — 64 bytes, never DER.
• Why it was needed. Measurement on 5–6 August 2026 found four canonicalisers and two signature encodings across implementations that each believed they agreed with the others. The two non-conforming ones are wrong in disjoint ways — the TypeScript hand-roll sorts with localeCompare but serialises correctly; the Python reference sorts correctly but escapes non-ASCII and emits 500.0 for 500. Both therefore agree with JCS, and with each other, on the payloads people test with. They diverge on a performer's name carrying a diacritic and on a lease cap authored as a decimal.
• The signature split is total, not partial. A DER-defaulted verifier rejects a conforming ES256 signature, and a conforming verifier rejects every signature the estate has ever written. The acceptance matrix is committed alongside the vectors.
• interop/vectors/ is normative test data, not illustration. Nine canonicalisation vectors plus signature vectors; an implementation is conformant if and only if it reproduces every one byte-for-byte. Vector 01 is RFC 8785's own published sample, and the generator refuses to emit unless its canonicaliser reproduces that sample exactly — so the file is anchored to the RFC rather than to any single library.
• The vectors' own claims are executed. Each vector records which non-conforming implementation it detects; verify-catches.mjs and verify_catches.py assert those claims are exactly true, so a vector cannot silently stop testing what it names. This caught a real defect during authoring: a vector for 500.0 had been neutered because JSON.stringify normalised the value to 500 when writing the manifest. Inputs are now carried as authored text.

Corrections to published facts¶

• The published decisions table stopped at ADR-009. ADR-010, ADR-011 and ADR-012 have existed since 2026-07-19 and were building into the site as pages that nothing linked to. The 2026-08-05 entry below corrected the ADR count in README and GOVERNANCE but not this table, which is the public-facing one. All are now listed, with ADR-013 shown as deliberately reserved.
• reference/verifier/src/crypto.ts claimed its output was "byte-identical to the issuer service, the subject signer, and an independent implementer — by specification, not by shared code." That was false when written: there was no specification to be identical by, and the file diverges from JCS on three of the nine interop vectors. The comment now states the non-conformance plainly and cites ADR-014; the code is ported in a follow-up.

2026-08-05¶

Licensing — gate G2 closed¶

• The repository is now licensed. It previously had no LICENSE file at all, which under copyright law means all rights reserved — while POSITIONING.md:24 called the spec "Open — published, free to implement" and promised a patent non-assert. spec/** (including all ADRs) is CC BY 4.0 (spec/LICENSE); everything else — schemas, reference code, scripts, site — is Apache-2.0 (LICENSE). Both are canonical texts, unmodified. Rationale and attribution wording: NOTICE.md.

Corrections to published facts¶

• ADR count. README and GOVERNANCE said "ADR-001 … ADR-009". There are twelve — ADR-010 (trust-anchor governance), ADR-011 (commercial model) and ADR-012 (exposure fields as an optional profile) have existed since 2026-07-19 and were absent from both counts.
• Schema count. README said "6 JSON Schemas". There are eight: the four core objects plus h2a-commercial.profile, h2a-media.profile, h2a-memory.profile and h2a-loss-event.
• Layout block. README listed only issuer-service under reference/; the verifier, subject-signer and witness-service components were undocumented, as was SPEC-COMMERCIAL.md and the check-interop.py CI gate.

Neutrality — scope of the 2026-07-18 claim corrected¶

The entry dated 2026-07-18 below states that references to specific commercial actors "were removed from the spec, ADRs, schemas, reference code, and site." That was not accurate for any of those categories except the site. As of this entry it is now true of reference code and schemas, and remains not true of the ADRs:

• Removed from reference code and fixtures: the founder-operated issuer namespace and a named operator/implementer in reference/verifier/{src/selftest.ts, src/crypto.ts, src/verify.ts, anchors.example.json, README.md}, reference/issuer-service/{src/service.ts, README.md}, reference/subject-signer/src/index.ts, reference/witness-service/src/sign.ts, and schemas/v0/examples/loss-event.valid.json. These now use RFC 2606 reserved-namespace examples (issuer.example.org, urn:h2a:grantee:example-operator, implementer id example-implementer). The verifier selftest was re-run after the rename: 21 assertions, 0 failures.
• Still naming a specific implementer: spec/adr/ADR-005:38, ADR-010:12,36, ADR-011:5,8,49,55, ADR-012:4. These are left in place deliberately and are not an oversight. ADR-010:36 is a disclosure — it records that the interim issuer namespace is founder-operated, which is the honest statement the ADR exists to make, and deleting it would make the document less truthful, not more neutral. ADR-011 and ADR-012 cite a specific implementer's internal documents as their source of record, so removing the names would destroy traceability rather than establish neutrality. Whether a neutral standard can cite one implementer's private docs as an ADR's source of record is a real governance question; it is recorded here as open rather than resolved by a find-and-replace.

2026-07-19¶

Commercial profile (optional, non-Core)¶

• New h2a-commercial profile. SPEC-COMMERCIAL defines an optional exposure/assurance profile for a commercial implementer that prices an assurance commitment. It is never required for Core conformance — a Core-conformant verifier ignores it. New schemas h2a-commercial.profile.schema.json (the exposure declaration — per-act limit, aggregate limit, assurance level, committed horizon, remedy_basis locked to service_credit) and h2a-loss-event.schema.json (the actuarial loss record). Money objects carry ISO-4217 currency, so the profile is inherently multi-currency.
• Core forward-compatibility rule (SPEC-CORE §1 → still v0.2). Profiles MAY define additional Grant and Decision Record fields; a verifier MUST ignore unrecognised fields and MUST NOT refuse a grant for carrying them. Enables the commercial fields to ride on the Core grant/decision-record without entering the conformance surface.
• Grant + Decision Record additions. Optional opaque exposure on the grant and exposure_snapshot on the decision record (profile-constrained). Core-owned evidence fields added to the decision record: horizon_committed_ms, horizon_measured_ms, horizon_breach, chain_conformance.
• The assurance ladder is the conformance ladder, priced. CONFORMANCE.md now states L1/L2/L3 are one ladder viewed two ways (Verifiable/Attested/Anchored = software/witnessed/enclave), and that profiles are never required for conformance. CONFORMANCE → v0.3 (clarified).
• ADRs. ADR-011 — commercial model (governed act billed, annual aggregate limit as the premium base, assurance-priced, service-credit remedy). ADR-012 — exposure fields are an optional profile, never Core, with the neutrality rationale.

2026-07-18¶

Neutrality & references¶

• Neutral, proposed-standard framing. All references to specific commercial actors were removed from the spec, ADRs, schemas, reference code, and site. A named example implementer, operator, generation vendors, specific unions/CMOs, and a specific witness domain are now stated only as neutral roles ("the implementer", "an operator", "a third-party generation provider", "a union or CMO", "an independent witness service"). Sales framing was rewritten as neutral standard language.
• Authorship. H2A is now attributed to Kilbowie as author, in the site footer, the home page, and Governance — offered as a neutral standard that privileges no implementation.
• Cited sources. Every external standard and legal instrument is now linked at its point of mention (RFC 2119, RFC 3161, eIDAS / Reg. (EU) 910/2014, GDPR Art. 7, C2PA, FIPS 140-3) and collected on a new References page in the nav.

Site¶

• Architecture & process-flow diagrams. The protocol's key flows are now shown visually, not just in prose: the five-gate verification algorithm (fail-closed, with the reason code each gate emits), the four-object relationship map, the issuer-vs-implementer revocation key-custody split (ADR-009), the L1→L2→L3 conformance ladder, the two-signature grant, delegation attenuation, and the evidence/anchoring pipeline. Diagrams are generated at build time as themed inline HTML (site/diagrams.py, placed with <!--DIAGRAM:name--> markers) — no client JS, and they follow the light/dark theme.
• New "How it works" page assembling the diagrams into a single visual walkthrough, linked from the top nav.
• Colour language extended: a third semantic accent, BLUE --info, joins GREEN --ok (pass) and RED --bad (fail) for informational/neutral states; a shared legend documents the key. The top nav now marks the current page.

2026-07-17¶

Site¶

• Theme toggle. A manual light/dark switch in the header, remembered across visits; the site still follows the operating-system setting until you choose. Syntax highlighting themes with it.
• "Last updated" per page. Each page footer shows when its content last changed, taken from the source file's last commit.
• This changelog, published at /changelog.
• Schemas page rebuilt as a generated per-object reference: Field / Type / Required / Description tables with nested sub-tables, enum and pattern labels, the conditional rules stated in prose, and every CI-validated example inlined. Generated from the schema JSON at build time (a coverage guard fails the build if a field would be dropped), so it can never drift from the schemas.
• Readability polish: dark mode, Pygments JSON/code highlighting, copy-to-clipboard buttons, heading anchors, on-page tables of contents, and wider tables for the schema reference.

Reference & CI¶

• Cross-language interop gate. The TypeScript issuer service signs a status list; the Python reference verifier verifies that signature, reads the revoked bit, and reaches the right decision — enforced in CI, no longer asserted only by inspection. The issuer service is also typechecked.
• Reference verifier is fail-closed on the status-list signature. verify() now requires the issuer's status public key; there is no path that permits a list it could not verify. A shared issuing helper builds schema-valid signed lists for both the demo and the CI gate.

Spec¶

• ADR-009 — revocation authority sits with the issuer. Revocation authority is defined as custody of the status-list signing key: the issuer signs the list, and an implementer is fetch-and-verify only, with no revoke endpoint and no list of its own. SPEC-CORE §4.3 now requires verifying the status-list signature and failing closed on an unreachable, unsigned, wrongly-signed, or stale list; CONFORMANCE L2 requires signed-list verification; the threat model covers status forgery and implementer-as-authority. SPEC-CORE → v0.2, CONFORMANCE → v0.3, THREAT-MODEL → v0.2. Detail in CHANGES-revocation-authority.md.
• The reference issuer/status service (reference/issuer-service/) was added as the fiduciary trust domain that holds the signing key.

Initial¶

• First publication: the core, media, and memory specifications; conformance levels; threat model; ADR-001 … ADR-008; six JSON Schemas with positive and negative examples; the runnable reference verifier; and this static site, deployed to h2a-protocol.org via GitHub Actions.