EGAF Automotive profile for ISO 26262 software

2026-08-30 · Assurance

The Automotive profile is L3. It extends Core for ISO 26262 software, supporting processes, and ASIL-oriented analyses, plus MISRA C:2012 for the coding-standard controls. All SAF controls are already active once level: L3 is declared.

Pre-release, founder-operated system; current capability labels describe the evidence boundary.

How the Evidence-Gated Assurance Framework works

The Evidence-Gated Assurance Framework (EGAF) is a spec-first assurance bar. It is in flight. A project claims conformance to EGAF L1, L2, or L3 at a given commit, with evidence attached. It is not a certification, an accreditation, or an authorization. Independent assessment of any organization remains a separate question.

Three parts make a run:

  1. A control catalog. Each control is either a machine check (an artifact an independent tool produced) or an evidence: attestation (a signed statement by a named principal). A named check with no backing artifact is DRIFT, never PROVEN. An empty-but-parsable file is not a verdict.
  2. A deterministic evaluator. Same inputs produce a byte-identical conformance report. The evaluator does not run tests or scanners. It reads artifacts other tools already produced and records their digests. An agent cannot manufacture PROVEN without producing the artifact the check names.
  3. A committed profile. .egaf/profile.yaml in the consumer repo is what CI evaluates. If that file is absent, the evaluator uses the bundled core profile, so L1 mandatory controls always apply. Profiles may only tighten a threshold; a loosening override is rejected at validation time.

Three levels. L1 Core is mandatory to claim any EGAF conformance: traceability, complexity and duplication caps, whole-codebase statement and branch coverage, mutation on changed files, verifier integrity, signed evidence, supply-chain hygiene. An EXCEPTION never satisfies an L1 control. L2 Regulated adds industry-profile controls (evidence packs, retention, model-risk records). L3 Safety-critical adds independence, structural coverage, tool-qualification inputs, and hazard linkage. Fail one applicable L1 control and the report's first line is L0.

Control status is derived from the seven check outcomes already used in Koinessa evidence bundles:

Check outcome Control status
PASS PROVEN
FAIL FAILED
SKIPPED-NOT-APPLICABLE with a recorded reason NOT-APPLICABLE
INFRASTRUCTURE-ERROR, TOOL-MISSING, EVIDENCE-INVALID, or ABSTAIN DRIFT
Missing evidence DRIFT

A level is achieved only when every applicable control at that level and below is PROVEN or NOT-APPLICABLE (L2/L3 may also count an unexpired EXCEPTION with an independent approver). The report always shows two honesty lists: Not proven (FAILED and DRIFT) and Accepted without proof (NOT-APPLICABLE and EXCEPTION). A clean badge over an empty honesty block is the failure the framework exists to prevent.

Frameworks are guidance. Controls are behavior. Evidence proves the behavior occurred. Organizational burdens — training, physical security, BAAs, a C3PAO assessment, DO-330 tool qualification, a SOC 2 Type II engagement — stay with the organization. The catalog cites clause identifiers and paraphrases; it does not reproduce normative text.

The catalog this series describes is a measured snapshot: 109 controls, vendored into Koinessa at pin 0.0.0-dev+98d08ef on 2026-08-30. The public specification repository is planned; until the operator creates its GitLab group, treat EGAF as a labeled pre-1.0 draft with publication pending. Koinessa's own first mainline conformance report is planned.

Read the Koinessa whitepaper for the surrounding Evidence-Gated Agentic Development thesis, and the verified-delivery report for what this system already publishes about itself.

The Automotive profile (id automotive, L3)

In flight. Source: vendor/egaf/catalog/profiles/automotive.yaml. Extends core.

Added frameworks:

safety_classes lists QM, ASIL-A, ASIL-B, ASIL-C, and ASIL-D. QM is ISO 26262's term for "no ASIL assigned". An adopter names its own component's actual class(es) in its own .egaf/profile.yaml, derived from its own hazard analysis and risk assessment — never copied from this default list.

Applicability: agentic and firmware. Releases and deploys declared.

Retention is program-length (months: null). It is set by the OEM's or Tier 1's own functional-safety management plan under ISO 26262 part 2, not by EGAF. Catalog research found no single universal retention number for an automotive program, so the field is left unset rather than invented.

L3 exceptions need an independent approver and a signed statement. L1 controls inherited from Core still cannot be excepted.

What the organization must still do: the HARA, the safety plan, confirmed-measures tracking, and tool qualification under ISO 26262-8. EGAF can require that a safety class was declared and that MISRA checks produced a non-vacuous artifact. It cannot assign an ASIL.

See Aerospace for DAL vocabulary and Industrial for SIL / EN 50128.

What this page does not claim

EGAF conformance is a per-commit statement a project makes about itself with evidence attached. It does not confer a certification, a SLSA level, or an authorization to operate. Citing a framework in a profile is a crosswalk, not a state the adopter has reached. Planned items carry no dates.

This article is one of ten in a series. Each page keeps the same mechanics and changes the profile.

The rest of the engineering blog covers the verification loop that EGAF sits on. The Koinessa home page states the product position.