Delegation Abuse
Abuse agent delegation mechanisms to escalate privileges through trusted agent chains
Privilege Escalation · Stage 4
Escalate capabilities beyond declared scope or bypass authorization
AGENT-IMPERSONATE
Impersonating trusted agents or administrative roles to gain unauthorized access
Reproduced in a controlled lab environment (DVAA) with documented steps.
delegation-privilege-escalation
Reproductions in Damn Vulnerable AI Agent, the OpenA2A intentionally-broken agent for kill-chain validation.
Recent observations
Technique-attributed observations from the AgentPwn + TrapMyAgent fleet, classified into Threat Matrix techniques by the registry evidence bridge. See the Attack Prevalence Index for the full distribution.
AgentPwn coverage
An AgentPwn trap page produces a payload tagged with this technique class. Following the AgentPwn taxonomy of trap pages shows what an agent encounters.
Delegation-abuse tier escalates through trusted agent chains.
Evidence by source
Evidence timeline
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified llm_crawler/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified llm_crawler/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Client fetched the canary embedded in APWN-A2A-002 on agentpwn.com (a2a-attack tier 2; classified browser/claimed)
Detection · HackMyAgent
npx hackmyagent secure --ciLive = implemented in hackmyagent; queued = declaredDefense · OASB controls
How to cite
AI Agent Threat Matrix T-4004 (Delegation Abuse). OpenA2A, 2026. https://threats.opena2a.org/techniques/T-4004