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Classification rules reference

This reference explains how scripts/seed_classification_rules.py routes an fsi_intakerequest into the Express, Standard, Full, or DefaultDeny outcomes for the agent-intake v1.0.0-preview workstream.

It summarizes the locked decisions in ADR-002, ADR-005, ADR-007, ADR-008, ADR-009, and the product-owner defaults in research/04-open-questions-resolved.md.

These defaults support compliance with FINRA Rule 3110, FINRA Rule 4511, SEC Rule 17a-4, GLBA 501(b), and SR 11-7 when combined with the downstream reviewer, retention, and handoff workflows. Organizations should confirm reviewer assignments, quorum thresholds, and country-routing policy before production rollout.

Inputs used by the classifier

The classifier reads the following fsi_intakerequest fields:

  • Trigger answers: fsi_t1initiatesfinancialtxn through fsi_t6crossborderdata
  • Audience: fsi_intendedaudience (or its label aliases)
  • Identity controls: fsi_makerupn, fsi_sponsorupn
  • Residency controls: fsi_makercountry, fsi_dataresidencycountry, fsi_privacyoverride

If a required field is missing, the classifier raises ValueError with the field name so the upstream flow can stop with a clear remediation message.

Trigger questions and why they matter

Field Plain-language meaning Why the rule exists
fsi_t1initiatesfinancialtxn The agent initiates, recommends, or approves a financial transaction. Supports higher scrutiny for supervisory evidence and operational-risk review under FINRA Rule 3110 and SR 11-7 principles.
fsi_t2customerfacing The agent will interact directly with customers or external-facing journeys. Supports review of customer-impact, disclosure, and escalation controls before the request can stay in the low-risk path.
fsi_t3autonomousunmonitored The agent can run without a human checkpoint or routine monitoring. Supports review of human oversight expectations and escalation design for autonomous behavior.
fsi_t4handlesnpi The agent will use non-public personal information. Supports privacy and GLBA 501(b) review. The Standard path adds Compliance when this trigger is positive.
fsi_t5handlesmnpi The agent will use material non-public information. Routes to Full by default because MNPI handling needs the highest review depth in the locked pilot defaults.
fsi_t6crossborderdata The agent will move data across country boundaries. Supports ADR-005: unresolved cross-border routing defaults to deny unless Privacy records an override in fsi_privacyoverride.

Yes and Not sure both count as positive trigger hits. The locked design is intentionally conservative: uncertainty still routes the request out of Express.

Audience-to-zone mapping

The audience answer maps to the governance zone through templates/policy-lookup-tables.yaml.

fsi_intendedaudience value Zone Meaning
Just me Zone 3 Personal scope
My team Zone 2 Team scope
My department Zone 2 Business-unit scope
Anyone in the firm Zone 1 Enterprise scope
External users Zone 1 External-facing scope

The classifier treats the policy file as the source of truth. If the file or the audience_to_zone section is missing, it falls back to the bundled defaults above.

Three-path decision tree

Step 1 — Count trigger hits

triggerHits is the count of T1-T6 answers equal to Yes or Not sure.

Step 2 — Compute the provisional path

Provisional path When it is used Resulting tier / zone Reviewer model
Express triggerHits == 0 and the audience maps to Zone 3 Tier 3 / Zone 3 Sponsor only; quorumRequired = 1; parallelReviewers = []
Standard Everything that is not Express or Full, including Zone-2 audiences and Zone-3 requests with 1-2 non-MNPI trigger hits Tier 2 / Zone 2 InfoSec + Privacy; add Compliance when fsi_t4handlesnpi is positive
Full Zone-1 audience, triggerHits >= 3, any positive fsi_t5handlesmnpi, or a Privacy-approved cross-border mismatch Tier 1 / Zone 1 InfoSec, Privacy, Compliance, Legal, and MRM

Step 3 — Apply deny gates

decisionPath is usually the same as pathUsed, but two defensive gates can replace it with DefaultDeny:

  1. Sponsor self-approval — ADR-008 denies the request when fsi_sponsorupn == fsi_makerupn.
  2. Cross-border default-deny — ADR-005 denies the request when fsi_t6crossborderdata = Yes, fsi_makercountry != fsi_dataresidencycountry, and fsi_privacyoverride is empty or false.

When a deny gate fires, pathUsed still records the provisional route (Express, Standard, or Full) so the downstream flow, logs, and analytics have a stable path value. routingReason captures the deny cause as either sponsor_self_approval or cross_border_data.

Reviewer quorum defaults

The policy file can override quorum and reviewer-routing behavior, but the bundled defaults are:

Tier Default quorum Default routing mode Reviewer board
Tier 3 1 of 1 Sequential Sponsor only
Tier 2 2 of 3 Parallel InfoSec, Privacy, plus Compliance when fsi_t4handlesnpi is positive
Tier 1 3 of 5 Parallel InfoSec, Privacy, Compliance, Legal, MRM

The classifier returns:

  • quorumRequired — the effective number of approvals required for the reviewer board
  • parallelReviewers — the reviewer set for Standard or Full
  • mrmRequired — true for Tier 1 when the mrm.required_when_tier_1 policy flag stays enabled
  • mrmHandoffStatus — Pending for Tier 1; NotApplicable for non-Tier-1 outcomes

Cross-border behavior and Privacy override

ADR-005 remains in force across all three paths:

  • If fsi_t6crossborderdata = Yes and the maker country does not match the declared data-residency country, the request defaults to DefaultDeny.
  • Privacy can override that gate by setting fsi_privacyoverride = true on the intake record.
  • A Privacy-approved mismatch still routes to Full, not Standard, because the request remains high-risk even after the override.
  • If the country pair is explicitly allow-listed in policy, the request can continue through Standard or Full without a deny outcome.

ADR-008 requires the sponsor to be a different person from the maker. The Power Pages experience should block that combination at submit time, but the classifier re-checks it so that imports, bulk updates, or replayed flow runs do not create an unsupported approval chain.

Policy override path

Customer-specific overrides live in templates/policy-lookup-tables.yaml. The classifier reads these sections defensively and falls back to bundled defaults if a section is absent:

  • audience_to_zone
  • data_residency
  • quorum
  • parallel_routing
  • reviewer_routing
  • mrm
  • retention_labels
  • managed_environment
  • dlp_connector_group

The implementation also tolerates minor key-shape drift (for example, parallelRouting vs. parallel_routing) so the router can keep classifying requests while the parallel schema workstream lands.

Operational notes for downstream docs

  • flow-configuration.md should treat decisionPath as the branch key and pathUsed as the reporting key.
  • admin-onboarding-guide.md should call out that Express is the only sponsor-only path.
  • Standard and Full require additional reviewer evidence; OQ-J explicitly treats the sponsor click as necessary but not sufficient outside Express.
  • Any change to T1-T6 still counts as a major modification under ADR-009 and should trigger re-classification.