# Dark Agent

> A semi-autonomous AI process that takes real actions on real systems but is not treated like a production system: no owner, no logs, no policy, no tests.

Category: org

A dark agent is any AI-powered process that can take actions, touches real data or systems, and is not treated like a first-class production system.

## Why it matters
Individually each one feels harmless. It is just a helper bot, just a codegen script, just a workflow. Collectively they form a shadow workforce of non-human employees you never onboarded, never gave a job description, and never pen-tested. When one breaks, nobody gets paged, because nobody owns it.

## In practice
You probably have dark agents right now. An LLM automation touching production data. An AI feature that can send email, modify code, or call external APIs. A workflow where you could not replay exactly what the AI did last Tuesday. If you cannot name the owner who gets paged when it fails, it is dark.

## Where it shows up in my work
This is the opening move of the Agent Civilization Field Manual. Naming dark agents is how you stop pretending the AI is a feature and start treating it like the unvetted employee with root access that it actually is.

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Source: https://ryanhunter.io/lexicon/dark-agent
Part of the Agent Infrastructure Lexicon by Ryan Hunter. https://ryanhunter.io/lexicon