Canonical Verifier Boundary Decision

This document is the decision surface for the final zk_enforced production boundary.

Current Options

Option A: Receipt Boundary

Production trust boundary remains:

• proposal-bound proof anchors
• proposal-bound verification receipts
• proposal-level zk_enforced policy
• stronger finalize path

Pros:

• fits the current deployed architecture
• lower migration risk
• lower operational complexity

Cons:

• final verifier semantics remain partially external
• reviewer burden stays higher

Option B: Verifier Program Boundary

Production trust boundary moves to:

• explicit on-chain verifier program enforcement
• proposal acceptance and/or finalize acceptance gated directly by verifier semantics

Pros:

• strongest security posture
• cleaner reviewer boundary
• strongest long-term production claim

Cons:

• higher engineering cost
• higher compute and transaction pressure
• requires more audit depth and runtime evidence

Current Recommendation

Do not declare Option B complete yet.

Short-term production hardening should continue with Option A plus:

• stronger receipt hierarchy
• immutable zk_enforced policy
• runtime captures
• external audit review

Only after that should the project freeze whether:

• Option A becomes the long-term production boundary
• or Option B is required before full promotion

Decision Rule

Promote the stronger path only when all of the following are closed:

• zk_enforced runtime captures exist across the wallet matrix
• external audit explicitly reviews the stronger path
• verifier boundary is frozen in writing
• operator flow is stable under Devnet evidence
• go-live decision artifacts still remain honest after the boundary is frozen