Abstract
Multi-agent systems derive their capabilities from sharing evidence, delegating tasks, and combining information across agents. The same process creates a safety problem: contributions that are admissible in isolation can jointly enable a prohibited use. Blocking every sensitive action avoids disclosure but defeats the purpose of collaboration. We introduce authorization-paired evaluation, which makes blocking prohibited uses and completing required authorized uses a joint success criterion, and FlowReview, a framework connecting object resolution, permission ranking, and deterministic enforcement. In controlled composition experiments, reviewing combined artifacts reduces the denied-commit rate from 86.0% to zero with no loss of authorized supply. Our findings show that preserving information and lineage alone does not ensure correct permission attribution. Object identity and permission must remain connected to execution through components whose outputs can be verified. Together, these findings establish a system-level requirement for multi-agent safety: govern composed information flows while preserving the authorized capabilities that make collaboration useful.
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Publication details
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- Open access
- Green open access
Cite this article
APA 7
Zhang, Y., Lyu, S., Wang, J., Ge, Y., Guo, J., Hamm, J., & Reddy, C. K. (2026). Deny Without Disabling: Authorization-Paired Evaluation and Control for Multi-Agent Systems. https://omanscience.com/en/articles/deny-without-disabling-authorization-paired-evaluation-and-control-for-multi-agent-systems
MLA 9
Zhang, Yunbei, et al. "Deny Without Disabling: Authorization-Paired Evaluation and Control for Multi-Agent Systems." https://omanscience.com/en/articles/deny-without-disabling-authorization-paired-evaluation-and-control-for-multi-agent-systems.
Chicago (author–date)
Zhang, Yunbei, Saiyue Lyu, Janet Wang, Yingqiang Ge, Jiang Guo, Jihun Hamm, and Chandan K. Reddy. 2026. "Deny Without Disabling: Authorization-Paired Evaluation and Control for Multi-Agent Systems." https://omanscience.com/en/articles/deny-without-disabling-authorization-paired-evaluation-and-control-for-multi-agent-systems.
Harvard
Zhang, Y., Lyu, S., Wang, J., Ge, Y., Guo, J., Hamm, J. and Reddy, C. K. (2026) 'Deny Without Disabling: Authorization-Paired Evaluation and Control for Multi-Agent Systems', Available at: https://omanscience.com/en/articles/deny-without-disabling-authorization-paired-evaluation-and-control-for-multi-agent-systems.
Vancouver
Zhang Y, Lyu S, Wang J, Ge Y, Guo J, Hamm J, et al. Deny Without Disabling: Authorization-Paired Evaluation and Control for Multi-Agent Systems. https://omanscience.com/en/articles/deny-without-disabling-authorization-paired-evaluation-and-control-for-multi-agent-systems
IEEE
Y. Zhang, S. Lyu, J. Wang, Y. Ge, J. Guo, J. Hamm, and C. K. Reddy, "Deny Without Disabling: Authorization-Paired Evaluation and Control for Multi-Agent Systems," https://omanscience.com/en/articles/deny-without-disabling-authorization-paired-evaluation-and-control-for-multi-agent-systems.