Zero-Trust Governance and Telemetry for AI Agents in Autonomous Networks

This white paper presents the technical architecture and operating model developed within the TM Forum Catalyst C26.0.933 project (“Zero-Trust Agents for Autonomous Networks”), awarded Best Moonshot Catalyst at the DTW Ignite 2026 event. The document addresses the governance gap in the transition toward Level 4 and 5 Autonomous Networks through the IPOE framework (Identity, Policy, Observability, and Evidence) under a strict Zero-Trust model.

It details the telemetry, monitoring, and assurance layer deployed by Optare Solutions, which guarantees per-hop traceability and real-time cryptographic verification of AI agents. The implementation demonstrates how to neutralize critical security risks, reduce onboarding times for new agents from three weeks to four hours, and optimize operational costs—laying the foundation to deploy secure and monetizable agentic automation in production environments.