Talked with 13-year-old podcast host Nolan Cohen (Raised by Robots) about the Internet of Agents—how personal agents find stores, prove authorization, and why open protocols like ANP matter. https://x.com/changgaowei/article/2112824558407307634… https://github.com/agent-network-protocol/AgentNetworkProtocol…

agent-network-protocol/AgentNetworkProtocol

Source: https://github.com/agent-network-protocol/AgentNetworkProtocol

Agent Network Protocol (ANP)

ANP aims to become the HTTP of the Agentic Web era: a protocol suite for agent identity, naming, discovery, negotiation, secure messaging, and application-level collaboration.

Note: This project has not issued any digital currency on any platform or blockchain.

Vision and Positioning

Agent Network Protocol (ANP) is an open-source communication protocol for intelligent agents. Its goal is to define how agents connect with each other and to build an open, secure, and efficient collaboration network for billions of agents.

We believe the agent internet is the next generation of information infrastructure after the human-centric internet. In this vision:

• From platform-centric to protocol-centric: data and services should not remain locked in isolated platforms. Agents need open protocols for direct connection.
• Connection is power: every agent can be both an information consumer and a service provider, able to discover, connect to, and collaborate with other nodes.
• AI-native network: agents should interact through semantically clear, machine-readable, and callable protocols rather than only through human-facing webpages.

Why We Need ANP

Current internet infrastructure is mature, but it still lacks a communication and connection layer designed for large-scale agent networks. ANP focuses on three challenges:

• 🌐 Interconnection: enable agents from different platforms and domains to authenticate, discover, and communicate with each other.
• 🖥️ Native interfaces: let AI use APIs, protocol documents, structured descriptions, and negotiated interfaces instead of imitating human browsing.
• 🤝 Efficient collaboration: allow agents to self-organize, self-negotiate, and build lower-cost collaboration networks.

Protocol Architecture

ANP is built on existing Internet infrastructure and organizes the released protocol capabilities into two core protocol layers plus domain-specific application protocols:

• 🌐 Open Internet Infrastructure: ANP reuses HTTP, CA, DNS, CDN, Search, and TLS instead of rebuilding a new network stack.
• 🔒 Identity and Encrypted Communication Layer: based on W3C DID and Web infrastructure. ANP-02 separates common authentication from DID method validation, including did:wba and native did:web, while the messaging Profiles define DID addressing and device-bound E2EE.
• 📡 Application Protocol Layer: includes Agent Description, Agent Discovery, and Agent Application Protocols. Domain protocols such as agent payment, authorization, authentication, and transaction protocols are built on top of this layer.
• 🧪 Meta-protocol status: ANP-06 remains a draft and is not part of the currently released architecture. The updated draft positions it as an Agent Description-driven semantic negotiation layer that uses MetaProtocolInterface, anp.get_capabilities, and anp.negotiate to select the subsequent interface, Profile, security profile, and schema.

Protocol Specification Index

The vNext workspace contains white paper revisions. The ANP-01 white paper revision is an informative working draft. ANP-05: DID-Based Authorization is located at the repository root, with its Chinese mirror in chinese/; it remains a v0.6 draft / not released. These drafts are not part of ANP 1.2. Current 1.2 normative references use the release paths above. The historical deprecated did:all documents retain their original identity; the current ANP-02 number denotes DID authentication.

Instant Messaging Profiles

The ANP Messaging 1.2 Profile index and its Chinese mirror include all nine documents:

Ordinary Direct, Group, Mention, and Attachment operations remain addressed by business DID or Group DID; device fan-out stays local to the receiving domain. P4 v2 introduces DID-only membership and Host-coordinated member DID updates. P5/P6 v2 use independent cryptographic device endpoints, including per-device-pair Direct sessions and multiple MLS leaves. Implementations MUST NOT reinterpret E2EE v1 state as v2 or silently downgrade E2EE v2 operations. P6’s candidate status and registered-code-point gate remain in force.

DID Compatibility Appendices

• Appendix A: did:wba k1_ Compatibility Extension
• Appendix B: Native did:web Integration: ANP-02 authentication, existing WNS/Web compatibility, and messaging composition without conversion to WBA.

Quick Start

• For method-independent ordinary API authentication, read ANP-02. It does not require Messaging, Handles, or device Manifests.

• For proposed DID-based agent authorization, read ANP-05 (draft). It explains when to use OAuth and when to use VC, defines the agent-authorization roadmap and v1 identity/basic-delegation scope, with integrity-bound metadata, first-contact admission, hosted/local OAuth flows, and independent VC direct presentation for delegation and role credentials; implementation support is not implied.

• To understand ANP concepts and usage, read the ANP Getting Started Guide or the Chinese guide.

• To implement ANP 1.2 identity, start with ANP-02, then ANP-03: did:wba for WBA method validation or Appendix B for native did:web integration.

• To publish an agent, read ANP-07: Agent Description Protocol and ANP-08: Agent Discovery Protocol.

• To build messaging, start from ANP-09 and then choose the required messaging profiles.

• To run demos, see ANP Sample Programs.

Protocol SDK

The open-source implementation of ANP is maintained in the AgentConnect repository:

• https://github.com/agent-network-protocol/AgentConnect

AgentConnect focuses on practical SDK support for did:wba, authentication, agent description, protocol negotiation, secure communication, and application protocols.

Open-Source Implementation: AWiki

AWiki is an open-source implementation of agent identity and messaging based on ANP:

• awiki-cli-rs2: Rust SDK and command-line client for agent identity and messaging.
• awiki-me: Cross-platform Flutter app for identity management and messaging.
• awiki-open-server: Open-source server implementation for agent identity and messaging.

Repository Layout

• 01-*.md, 02-*.md, 03-*.md, 04-*.md, 06-*.md, 07-*.md, 08-*.md, 09-*.md: English core documents, with document version 1.2 and individual status markers.
• 05-anp-did-authorization-protocol-specification.md: English ANP-05 authorization draft, v0.6 / not released; outside the ANP 1.2 release.
• message/: the ANP Messaging 1.2 Profile suite and index; P6 retains candidate status.
• chinese/: Chinese mirrors of core and messaging specifications, the ANP-05 authorization draft, and related research notes.
• vnext/: English and Chinese ANP-01 white paper revisions. Current 1.2 documents remain in their release paths.
• application/: independently versioned application-layer protocols such as AP2.
• docs/: guides, extended reading, and community operations documents.
• blogs/: articles and historical protocol analysis.
• examples/: ADP assets, API interfaces, Messaging 1.2 examples, and ANP-02 vectors. The example directory names retain -vnext for path compatibility.
• images/ and standard/: shared figures and standardization references.

Further Reading

• Extended Reading
• ANP Technical White Paper
• AgentConnect Examples

Milestones

• Define and implement the identity authentication and secure communication foundation.
• Release did:wba v1.1 with default e1_ Ed25519 path binding and compatibility guidance for k1_ and native did:web.
• Define WNS handles as a human-readable naming layer for DID-based agents.
• Release the Agent Description Protocol and Agent Discovery Protocol.
• Release the meta-protocol after the draft is stabilized.
• Split end-to-end instant messaging into an overview plus nine interoperable profiles.
• Integrate ANP-02 authentication, ANP-03 identity continuity, ANP-04 naming, and native Web integration into the ANP 1.2 documents.
• Integrate all nine messaging documents and their mixed-version Profile catalog into ANP 1.2.
• Complete the registered MLS ExtensionType release gate for stable P6 v2.
• Add an AP2 payment adaptation draft to the application layer.
• Continue aligning SDK implementations and examples with the 1.2 specification set and validating actual interoperability.
• Continue standardization work and expand domain-specific application protocols.

Contact Us

We have established an ANP open-source technical community to advance ANP development through an open-source community approach. We sincerely invite you to join our community.

• Email: [email protected]
• Additional contact emails: [email protected], [email protected]
• Discord: https://discord.gg/sFjBKTY7sB
• Official website: https://agent-network-protocol.com/
• GitHub: https://github.com/agent-network-protocol/AgentNetworkProtocol
• WeChat: flow10240

Contributing

We welcome contributions in any form. Please refer to CONTRIBUTING.md.

Contributors

We extend our sincere gratitude to all contributors for their outstanding work and dedication to the Agent Network Protocol project.

• View the full contributors list

Release Status and Versioning

Current specification set: ANP 1.2. Core specifications and all nine messaging documents have been integrated from vNext into their canonical release paths. ANP-02 provides DID-method-independent authentication for did:wba and native did:web; ANP-03 defines WBA method rules and identity continuity; ANP-04 defines WNS naming. Agent description and discovery documents are aligned with this release.

Release scope: root-level specifications and message/ are the current English documents, with Chinese mirrors under chinese/. ANP-06 remains a draft. P6 Group E2EE is included in the 1.2 documentation but remains a candidate pending its registered MLS ExtensionType release gate; the provisional 0xF0A1 value is not a completed registration. Application protocols are independently versioned; ANP-10 is an AP2 adaptation draft, not a released stable payment standard.

ANP Messaging 1.2: the Profile index defines the mixed-version suite. P1/P2/P3/P7/P8 and the P9 binding retain v1; P4 Group Base and P5/P6 E2EE use v2. Publication of specifications does not establish SDK or product implementation support; capability advertisement must reflect actual support and each Profile’s release restrictions.

Versioning note: Version: 1.2 identifies the specification/document release version, not a wire version. Profile identifiers, protocolVersion, interface versions, algorithms, and signature/AAD formats follow their owning specifications and are not globally renumbered. P4/P5/P6 adopt the v2 contracts already defined in vNext; other Profile identifiers and example wire-version fields remain unchanged.

License

The root project license is Apache License 2.0 (Apache-2.0). Retain the applicable license, copyright, and attribution notices. Repository copyright notices identify ANP Community; author and contributor credits remain in their own records.

This project-level statement does not replace separate notices in historical drafts, archived documents, or third-party reference material. Review those materials individually before redistribution or a project donation; updating a license label or copyright notice does not establish ownership or clear third-party rights.

Copyright Notice

Copyright (c) 2024 ANP Community This file is released under the Apache License 2.0. You are free to use and modify it, but must retain this copyright notice.