We’re entering a new era where AI agents aren’t just tools—they’re actors in the enterprise ecosystem. Microsoft’s recent announcement on extending Zero Trust to secure the agentic workforce is a wake-up call for legal and risk professionals.
The challenge?
Autonomous agents are no longer theoretical. They make decisions, perform actions, and interact across networks. But they don’t fit into traditional identity frameworks—or existing legal ones. That creates a vacuum of accountability, control, and trust.
Let’s reframe the conversation:
🔐 Zero Trust isn’t just an IT strategy—it’s a governance framework.
Microsoft’s vision highlights five capabilities:
- Verifiable credentials
- Conditional access and continuous monitoring
- Segmented, sandboxed environments
- Human oversight with escalation paths
- AI-specific policy controls and attestation
Legal teams need to start viewing these as policy hooks for ensuring agency, attribution, and auditability in AI-infused environments.
💡 So how do we operationalize trust?
By embedding legal by design into product and security frameworks:
- Assign legal “personas” to agents: Who are they acting on behalf of?
- Develop cross-functional AI incident response protocols
- Translate risk into role-based controls for both human and non-human actors
- Align agent permissions with contractual commitments and IP protections
🚧 The biggest risk isn’t rogue agents—it’s misaligned systems of accountability.
We must evolve beyond static risk registers and toward dynamic legal orchestration across AI, product, and security functions. That’s how we enable innovation responsibly—not slow it down.
This is more than policy—it’s architecture.
Let’s build for trust, not just compliance.
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