SREL — Semantic Risk Exchange Language
Open Standard — v1.0

A common language for AI risk assessment output

SREL is a normative context-free grammar for structured, machine-readable AI risk assessment documents. Vendor-neutral. Geometrically grounded. Built for downstream consumption by model risk management, monitoring, and remediation systems.

Structured risk output that machines can read and humans can audit

AI risk assessments today are PDFs, spreadsheets, and PowerPoint decks. They cannot be ingested by monitoring systems, compared across vendors, or automatically escalated when thresholds are crossed. SREL is the interchange format that closes this gap: a context-free grammar specifying required sections, required keys, value types, and semantic invariants for AI risk assessment documents.

01

Normative grammar

Defined in ABNF per RFC 5234. Any document either conforms or does not. Conformance is machine-checkable.

02

TOML wire format

Preferred lexical realization is TOML 1.0.0. Alternate lexical embodiments (JSON, YAML, XML) satisfying the same grammar are also conformant.

03

URN-identified

Documents declare their profile by URN per RFC 8141. No DNS dependency. urn:srel:profile:ai:v1 is the AI Risk Profile.

04

Geometric substrate

Scores are derived from n-simplex risk decomposition. Nine dyadic groups × six compositional periods = 54 named risk primitives, each at a structurally located matrix position.

05

Meta-condition veto

Six binary structural prerequisites (KILL, SAF, HITL, AUT, TRU, MAN) gate the composite. Breach of any one collapses the score to zero regardless of all other measurements.

06

Versioned profiles

The meta-language hosts multiple domain profiles. AI risk is the first. Cybersecurity, climate, model risk (SR 11-7), biological risk, and infrastructure resilience profiles are planned.

Eight required section classes in the AI Risk Profile

[capability]
Capability normalizer state: metric value, reference level, functional form, and computed normalizer C(κ). Penalizes the composite when capability outpaces safety.
[meta]
Binary state vector for KILL, SAF, HITL, AUT, TRU, and MAN meta-conditions, plus their product. Any zero in the product collapses the composite regardless of primitive scores.
[primitive."g.p"]
One section per risk primitive at coordinate g.p (group I–IX × period P1–P6 = 54 positions). Each carries code token, score, shadow distance, lambda, and weight.
[register_weights.*]
Five sections (statics, mechanics, dynamics, thermodynamics, kinematics) each specifying the register-specific weight profile used to compute register sub-scores.
[[compound]]
Zero or more compound primitive entries, each identified by code token, constituent base-primitive coordinates, and contribution weight.
[composite]
The unified composite SSS_extended, categorical band (PASS / WATCH / DRIFT / ELEVATED / CRITICAL), and the five register sub-scores.
[explanation]
Optional. Top contributors and adverse-action narrative identifying the primitives most significantly driving the composite toward a lower band.
header
Schema version (URN), assessment ID (UUID), timestamp (ISO 8601), system ID, and optional metadata extensions.

One meta-language. Multiple risk domains.

Each domain profile inherits the meta-language grammar and adds domain-specific required sections. Profile identifiers follow the pattern urn:srel:profile:<domain>:v<N>.

urn:srel:profile:ai:v1
Artificial Intelligence
Active — v1.0
urn:srel:profile:cyber:v1
Cybersecurity
Planned
urn:srel:profile:model:v1
Model Risk (SR 11-7)
Planned
urn:srel:profile:climate:v1
Climate Transition
Planned
urn:srel:profile:bio:v1
Biological Risk
Planned
urn:srel:profile:infra:v1
Infrastructure
Planned

Open specification. Protected methodology.

Patent License Commitment

The inventor commits, conditional upon issuance of any patent on the applications disclosing the SREL specification, to grant a royalty-free, world-wide, non-exclusive, irrevocable license under any claim of the issued patent that would necessarily be infringed by implementing the SREL specification as published — solely to the extent necessary to implement, validate, transport, or consume SREL-conformant documents.

This commitment covers the format. It does not extend to claims directed to the geometric risk-scoring methodology from which the format derives. The scope is the interchange standard, not the engine.

Specification text
CC0 1.0 Universal
Public domain dedication. No attribution required.
Reference implementations
Apache License 2.0
Use, modify, distribute freely. Attribution required.
Conformance mark
USPTO Certification Mark
Intent-to-use application filed. Licensed to conformant implementations.