Government agencies are under pressure to adopt AI for everything from citizen services to intelligence analysis. But federal systems operate under constraints that commercial AI tools weren't built for: air-gapped networks, security clearances, and strict data sovereignty requirements.

You can't just point GPT-4 at classified documents and hope for the best. You need a runtime that was designed for this threat model from day one.

AKIOS provides exactly that: a Security Cage that runs entirely on-premise, with no external network dependencies, and produces audit trails that satisfy federal compliance frameworks.

The Problem

Federal agencies face a unique paradox: they have some of the highest-value data in the world (intelligence, law enforcement, citizen records) and some of the strictest rules about how that data can be processed. Commercial AI tools assume cloud connectivity, third-party APIs, and data sharing — all of which are non-starters for classified environments.

AKIOS was designed for the zero-trust, air-gapped threat model from the ground up.

The Regulatory Landscape

Government AI in the United States is governed by some of the strictest security frameworks in the world:

RegulationScopeHow AKIOS Enforces It
FedRAMP Standardized security assessment for cloud services used by federal agencies AKIOS runs entirely on-premise. No cloud dependency. Sidesteps FedRAMP cloud concerns.
NIST SP 800-53 The gold standard for federal security controls — AC, AU, SC, SI control families AKIOS maps directly to Access Control, Audit, System Communications, and System Integrity families.
FISMA Continuous monitoring and risk management for federal information systems Merkle-chained audit logs provide continuous evidence of authorized AI use.
EO 14110 AI executive order mandating safety testing, red-teaming, and transparency Deterministic sandbox enables reproducible safety testing. Full transparency via audit chain.
ITAR / EAR Export control regulations requiring certain data never leaves US soil Zero network access at kernel level. Data sovereignty enforced by infrastructure, not policy.

The Concept: Policy as Code

AKIOS introduces the concept of a "Security Cage" — an ephemeral, sandboxed runtime where data is processed under strict, code-defined policies. For government deployments, the key feature is kernel-level network blocking: not application-level firewalls, but seccomp-bpf filters that make network syscalls physically impossible.

The Workflow: Classified Document Analysis

StepWhat HappensSecurity Control
1. Ingestion Documents loaded into the cage on an air-gapped workstation. No network connection. Read-only filesystem agent. Data cannot be copied outside the cage boundary.
2. Redaction Classified markers, clearance levels, and PII stripped before AI processing SSN, clearance codes, program names replaced with tokens. Originals never reach the LLM.
3. AI Analysis Local model processes documents — summarization, entity extraction, cross-referencing All network syscalls blocked at kernel level. No external data transmission possible.
4. Classification Review Outputs checked against classification guidelines before leaving the cage Anything flagged as potentially classified goes to human review. AI cannot declassify.
5. Audit Every operation logged into a Merkle-chained audit trail Tamper-evident proof for Inspector General reviews and congressional oversight.

Architecture

graph LR
    SIS["Classified\nSystem"] -->|"documents\n(air-gapped)"| FS["filesystem agent\nread-only"]

    subgraph CAGE["AKIOS Security Cage · seccomp-bpf + cgroups v2"]
        FS --> PII["Redaction Engine\n«SSN» «CLEARANCE» «PROGRAM»"]
        PII --> LLM["llm agent\nlocal model only\nno network syscalls"]
        LLM --> TE["tool_executor\nentity extraction"]
        TE --> VALID["Classification Check\nhuman review gate"]
        VALID --> MERKLE["Merkle Chain\nSHA-256 signed"]
    end

    MERKLE -->|"approved output\n(reviewed)"| Output["Analyst\nWorkstation"]
    MERKLE -->|"audit export\n(immutable)"| IG["Inspector General"]
    IG --> Congress["Congressional\nOversight"]

Policy Configuration

The entire compliance posture is defined in a single YAML file:

# government-airgap-policy.yml
security:
  sandbox: strict
  network: blocked  # all network syscalls blocked at kernel level
  allowed_endpoints: []  # zero network access
  pii_redaction:
    enabled: true
    patterns: [ssn, clearance_level, program_name, agency_code, badge_number]
    mode: aggressive
  budget:
    max_cost_per_run: 0.00  # local model — zero API cost
    currency: USD
  audit:
    merkle_chain: true
    export_format: jsonl
    retention_days: 2555  # 7 years — federal records retention
  constraints:
    local_model_only: true
    classification_review: mandatory

What the Analyst Sees

At the end of the workflow, the intelligence analyst receives a structured report:

FieldValue
Documentbrief-2026-0210-****8492.pdf
SummaryRegional threat assessment — 3 entities identified, 2 cross-references to existing reporting
Entities Extracted12 organizations, 8 locations, 4 dates (all abstracted)
Classification Flag⚠️ Output contains potential FOUO references — routed to human review
Confidence86%
Audit Hashf1a8d3...c72e
Network Access Attempted❌ None — all network syscalls blocked at kernel level

No classified content in AI output. No network exfiltration. Just structured analysis with a tamper-evident proof chain.

Why It Matters

  • True Air-Gap: AKIOS blocks all network syscalls at the kernel level — not just at the application layer. Even a jailbroken model cannot phone home.
  • No Cloud Dependency: The entire runtime runs locally. No external API calls, no telemetry, no third-party services.
  • NIST 800-53 Mapping: AKIOS audit logs map directly to federal control families. Compliance officers can generate evidence reports for Authority to Operate (ATO) reviews.
  • Inspector General Ready: The Merkle-chained audit trail provides tamper-evident proof that AI was used within authorized boundaries.
  • Data Sovereignty: ITAR/EAR compliance is enforced by infrastructure, not by policy documents. Data physically cannot leave the workstation.

Try It Yourself

pip install akios
akios init my-project
akios run templates/batch_processing.yml

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