OSSP Specification v1.0.0

Technical specification for the Open Safety Signal Protocol

Contents

Overview

The Open Safety Signal Protocol (OSSP) defines how AI systems emit governance, safety, and risk signals. OSSP is built on CloudEvents 1.0 for transport with AI-specific schemas designed for compliance with EU AI Act, NIST RMF, and ISO 42001.

Key Features

  • CloudEvents 1.0 structured JSON over HTTP
  • JSON Schema 2020-12 validation
  • AI-specific event types and data schemas
  • OTLP mapping for observability platforms
  • W3C Trace Context propagation
  • Vendor-neutral governance model

Event Types

OSSP defines six core event types for AI safety telemetry. Each event type has a corresponding JSON Schema for validation.

ai.safety.guardrail.interaction

Track guardrail activations, blocks, warnings, and policy enforcement.

Key Fields: action_taken, severity, guardrail_id, reason

View Schema

ai.performance.drift.detected

Signal model performance degradation and drift detection.

Key Fields: metric_name, threshold, current_value, drift_type

View Schema

ai.governance.lifecycle.change

Track model deployment, versioning, and governance milestones.

Key Fields: stage, previous_stage, change_reason, approver

View Schema

ai.security.abuse.attempt

Detect prompt injection, jailbreaks, and security violations.

Key Fields: vector, detector_id, confidence, sample_id

View Schema

ai.safety.policy.violation

Track policy violations and compliance infractions.

Key Fields: policy_id, violation_type, decision, approver

View Schema

ai.dataset.access

Monitor dataset access patterns and usage tracking.

Key Fields: dataset_id, access_type, purpose, user_id

View Schema

Conformance Levels

OSSP defines two conformance levels to accommodate different implementation requirements:

Level A - Basic Compliance

  • CloudEvents 1.0 structured JSON over HTTP (Content-Type: application/cloudevents+json; charset=utf-8)
  • The CloudEvent envelope datacontenttype MUST be application/json (describes the data body)
  • dataschema MUST point to the correct per-type JSON Schema
  • Payload MUST validate against the referenced schema

Level B - Full Observability

  • All Level A requirements
  • OTLP mapping implemented (HTTP /v1/logs), preserving fields listed in MAPPINGS.md
  • W3C Trace Context propagated when present
Requirements: Vendors MUST document their conformance level and list any extensions.

Common Resource Schema

All OSSP events include a standardized resource object within the CloudEvent data field:

{
  "resource": {
    "model_id": "gpt-4o",           // Required: AI model identifier
    "environment": "production",    // Required: deployment environment
    "model_version": "2025-09-01.3", // Optional: specific model version
    "region": "us-east-1",          // Optional: deployment region
    "tenant_id": "acme-corp"        // Optional: multi-tenant identifier
  }
}
Field Type Required Description
model_id string Yes Unique identifier for the AI model or system
environment string Yes Deployment environment (e.g., production, staging, development)
model_version string No Specific version or build of the model
region string No Geographic region where the model is deployed
tenant_id string No Multi-tenant identifier for SaaS deployments

Integration Patterns

HTTP Transport

OSSP events are sent as CloudEvents over HTTP with proper Content-Type headers:

POST /v1/events HTTP/1.1
Content-Type: application/cloudevents+json; charset=utf-8
Authorization: Bearer <token>

{
  "specversion": "1.0",
  "id": "uuid",
  "source": "urn:app:my-system",
  "type": "ai.safety.guardrail.interaction",
  "time": "2025-09-18T14:23:54Z",
  "datacontenttype": "application/json",
  "dataschema": "https://ossp.io/schema/v1.0.0/...",
  "data": { ... }
}

OTLP Mapping

For observability platforms supporting OpenTelemetry, OSSP events map to LogRecord format:

  • data.severity → severity_number (INFO=9, WARN=13, ERROR=17, FATAL=21)
  • subject → LogRecord attributes
  • CloudEvent metadata preserved in attributes

Trace Context Propagation

W3C Trace Context headers are propagated for distributed tracing:

traceparent: 00-4bf92f3577b34da6a3ce929d0e0e4736-00f067aa0ba902b7-01
tracestate: vendor=value

References

Formal Specification

Complete technical specification document with normative requirements.

Read Spec

JSON Schemas

Machine-readable schemas for all event types with validation rules.

Browse Schemas

Examples

Real-world examples and test events for each schema type.

View Examples

OTLP Mappings

Normative mappings to OpenTelemetry for observability integration.

View Mappings