vs OAuth 2.0
getai.id vs OAuth 2.0.
OAuth authorizes apps. getai.id identifies agents. The two are complementary primitives — getai.id isn't a replacement for OAuth, it's the layer OAuth was never designed to provide.
OAuth 2.0 was specified in 2012 for browser-based consent flows: a human clicks "Allow," and an access token flows back to a third-party app. It assumes session-scoped, human-in-the-loop authorization with a redirect URI.
Autonomous AI agents break those assumptions. There is no browser, no redirect, sometimes no human in the loop at the moment of action. getai.id fills that gap — by binding the agent's on-chain identity to the human who authorized it, so every action attributes upward to a verified principal, even when no human is online.
Side by side
OAuth 2.0 vs UAIIP — session auth vs agent identity
| Capability | OAuth 2.0 | UAIIP |
|---|---|---|
| Identifies the AI agent itself | ||
| Identifies the human operator behind the agent | Partial | |
| Works without a browser redirect | ||
| Survives token rotation with continuous identity | ||
| On-chain audit trail of authority | ||
| Zero-knowledge proof of verification status | ||
| Regulatory attribution (EU AI Act / FATF / MiCA) | ||
| Behavioral fingerprint of registered model | ||
| Composable with existing bearer-token auth |
OAuth 2.0 is fine when
- Browser-based, human-in-the-loop authorization to a SaaS app.
- Short-lived sessions where the human is present at consent time.
- Scope-bounded, app-to-app integrations on a single platform.
- No regulator is asking who built or operated the system.
You need UAIIP when
- Your agents act asynchronously, on someone's behalf, without a live consent prompt.
- You need to attribute every agent action upward to a biometrically-verified human.
- You need an identity that's portable across platforms — not bound to any single OAuth IdP.
- You need cryptographic non-repudiation under EU AI Act, FATF, MiCA, or BSA/AML.
- Behavioral fingerprinting matters because not every counterparty cooperates.
FAQ
Common questions.
- Is OAuth deprecated for agents?
- No. OAuth remains the right primitive for human-in-the-loop authorization. getai.id layers on top: it identifies the agent and binds it to the human who authorized OAuth in the first place, so verifiers can audit both the consent and the actor.
- Can OAuth scopes substitute for getai.id capability vectors?
- OAuth scopes describe what an app may access. getai.id capability vectors describe what an agent is authorized to do — including off-platform actions OAuth never sees. They cover different surfaces and compose well together.
- Where does the bearer token live in getai.id?
- Authentication still flows through whichever protocol you already use (OAuth, mTLS, SAML). getai.id attaches an attestation header (X-UAIIP-Attestation) so the verifier learns identity and authority alongside the bearer token.