If the team answers my question using highly technical terminology I don't understand, what should I do?
If the team's answer involves technical terminology you don't understand, you can directly ask them to explain using a concrete metaphor or scenario example — asking them to use a specific scenario like "if the protocol adds a lending feature tomorrow, how would my agent react" instead of an abstract technical description. A team that genuinely understands its own architecture can usually explain this logic in simple language — if the other party keeps evading with jargon and can't give a concrete example, that itself is a signal worth noting.
You can also record the team's original answer and later find a trusted friend with technical background, or directly ask other users in the community, to see whether anyone can help explain it in plain language — this process doesn't require you to have technical ability yourself, just not being afraid to ask one more question.
If I find this product adopts a denylist, does that mean I should immediately stop using it and switch to a product with an allowlist?
You don't necessarily need to make this decision immediately — it depends on your specific usage scenario and risk tolerance. If you're only using this agent for relatively small operations you can accept losing entirely, the extra risk a denylist brings might be within your acceptable range; if you're planning to entrust most of your funds to this agent, a denylist's architectural risk deserves more serious consideration, possibly needing to prioritize finding an allowlist alternative, or using a more conservative position size to address this extra risk.
There's no one-size-fits-all standard answer for this decision — what matters is getting a clear answer through this verification checklist before you decide, rather than carrying this risk in complete ignorance. That's this checklist's genuine goal: grounding your decision in sufficient information, rather than going by feel.
Besides asking about the default reaction when a new feature launches, are there other similarly concrete questions I can use to verify other aspects of the authorization design?
Yes — you can apply a similar questioning logic to design a concrete question for other aspects you care about. To confirm the revocation mechanism's actual response speed, you could ask "If I click the revoke button right now, what happens to a transaction the agent already submitted but hasn't confirmed yet?" To confirm multi-protocol combination risk, you could ask "If my agent is authorized to access both Protocol A and Protocol B simultaneously, can assets transfer directly between them, and have you assessed the maximum combined exposure?"
The common feature of this kind of concrete question is that they all focus on an edge scenario that might not have been fully considered when the design was originally made — asking about the concrete reaction under this kind of edge scenario usually gets a more reference-valuable answer than asking a vague question like "is your product safe." This is also the verification methodology emphasized repeatedly throughout this series — testing with a concrete scenario, rather than accepting a vague assurance.
If I use a product fully delegated to an agent's management, with no chance to directly ask the technical team myself, does this checklist still apply?
Even if you use a fully delegated product, this checklist's core logic still applies — just the verification channel might need adjusting. You can raise this concrete question through the product's support email, community forum, or public Q&A channel — most formally operating products provide some form of user inquiry channel; if you genuinely can't find any channel at all, this can't even find anywhere to ask a basic question situation is itself a signal worth factoring into your assessment of this product's transparency.
Additionally, you can also try checking whether this product has a third-party audit report — an audit report sometimes mentions the specific design pattern its authorization architecture adopts. Even if the team itself doesn't proactively explain it, a third party's technical analysis might indirectly reveal this layer of information too.
This series earlier discussed Allowlist vs. Denylist Permission Design — the foundational architectural choice determining whether an authorization system's default reaction to an unknown scenario is to deny or allow. This article provides a concrete, few-minute verification method to help you judge which design philosophy the DeFAI agent you're using actually adopts.
First find the publicly available technical documentation, API documentation, or terms of service for the DeFAI product you're using — these documents usually describe the authorization system's operating logic, your first-hand source for verification.
If the documentation explicitly states something like "only actions on the permitted list can execute," it means this system adopts an allowlist. This kind of explicit statement is itself a positive signal, indicating the team has a clear understanding of its own authorization architecture and is willing to explain it publicly.
If Step Two doesn't find allowlist-related language, next search the documentation for a statement about which actions are explicitly forbidden — if the documentation describes "every action is allowed except the forbidden items listed below," it means this system adopts a denylist.
If the technical documentation never explains this layer of architectural logic at all, directly ask support or the development team a specific question: "When the protocol adds a new, never-assessed feature in the future, will my agent be permitted to use it by default, or blocked by default and require me to proactively update authorization?" This question's answer directly reveals this system's underlying design philosophy, no guessing or inferring required on your part.
Once you have a clear answer, go back and compare this result against whether it matches your own expected risk-management approach — if you're managing relatively large funds, an allowlist is usually the more conservative, preferable design; if you value operational convenience more and are willing to accept slightly higher risk, a denylist is also an acceptable choice, but you need to recognize what tradeoff you're actually accepting.
These five steps require no coding background at all — just a willingness to spend a few minutes checking documentation or directly asking a question. Most users have never proactively confirmed their agent's default reaction when facing an unknown scenario — this checklist reminds you this is actually a key question that can be clarified with a single sentence, yet gets completely overlooked far too often.