---
title: "What is PolicyCortex?"
description: "A connected compliance program, from requirements and remediation to evidence, assessment preparation, and ongoing readiness in your own environment."
url: https://policycortex.com/what-is-policycortex
sealed: 2026-09-02
amended: 2026-09-05
register: what-is-policycortex
records: 7
digest: sha3:086c076e79a0e4a28dd3b66bac4d33a58d5909121febfee25964502a43395622
---

# What is PolicyCortex?

The platform, in plain language.

PolicyCortex is a compliance and assurance platform for regulated cloud and AI systems. It connects requirements, control implementation, remediation, and verifiable evidence in your tenant, helping your organization prepare for self-assessment, independent assessment, and authorization review, and maintain readiness as systems change.

[Request Access](https://app.policycortex.com/auth?mode=request-access) · [How it works](https://policycortex.com/architecture)

Access is reviewed. Scope and onboarding are agreed with your team.

## Who it is for

Security, compliance, and infrastructure teams responsible for regulated systems. You may be establishing your first program, closing gaps in an existing implementation, preparing a review package, or keeping an authorized system ready for its next assessment. PolicyCortex connects that work to the evidence behind it.

1. Defense contractors pursuing CMMC and managing CUI
2. National laboratories under DOE and NNSA
3. Federal agencies
4. Defense Industrial Base organizations
5. Regulated commercial environments running autonomous systems

1. ATO and continuous authorization
2. CMMC Level 2, the 110 requirements of NIST SP 800-171
3. FedRAMP 20x
4. NIST SP 800-53 Rev 5 and NIST SP 800-171
5. OMB M-25-21 AI use-case inventories and minimum risk management practices

Licensed software with access arranged through our team; fixed-scope delivery engagements are optional. The [pricing page](https://policycortex.com/pricing) describes the license; the [engagement page](https://policycortex.com/engagement) describes the optional delivery work.

## What it produces: three proofs

Everything PolicyCortex exports is a projection of three records, kept on one hash chain inside your tenant. Each is stated here in one paragraph; each has a page of its own.

### Proof of state

PROOF 01 / STATE

Proof of state is a point-in-time record of cloud configuration, taken from the cloud provider APIs, content hashed with SHA3-256, chained to the previous record, retained for seven years, and regenerable to any timestamp a second party picks. It answers what was true in the environment on a date somebody else names, not what is true now.

[Read the record](https://policycortex.com/proof/state)

### Proof of change

PROOF 02 / CHANGE

Proof of change records who or what altered the environment, under what authority, with before and after state hashes, the hashed delta, the policy gates that ruled, and a rollback identifier, committed to an append-only chain that administrators cannot edit without detection. Changes made around the gates surface at the next capture as drift with no authority attached.

[Read the record](https://policycortex.com/proof/change)

### Proof of agency

PROOF 03 / AGENCY

Proof of agency holds three artifacts for every autonomous action: the envelope that permitted it before it ran, the chained record of what it did, and the counterfactual showing what would have blocked it had it been one notch different. Envelope versions are records, so the authority in force at 02:14 comes from the chain, not the current settings page.

[Read the record](https://policycortex.com/proof/agency)

![The PolicyCortex evidence package export: assessor-ready ZIP with complete evidence inventory, validation results, POA&M items, SSP, SAR, OSCAL and eMASS formats, and AES-256 protection](https://policycortex.com/images/pcx-evidence-package-export-1600.webp)

Exhibit W-1 · the assessor-ready package all three proofs ship in: inventory, validations, POA&M, SSP, SAR. One ZIP, hash chained, AES-256 protected. Illustrative demo data; the interface is real.

## What it is not

The register states its limits in the same voice as its claims. Four things PolicyCortex is not.

**Stated limit.**

1. **Your team owns the program.** PolicyCortex connects controls, remediation, and evidence. Your organization implements its policies, assigns responsibilities, and makes its risk decisions. Optional delivery engagements provide support for that work.
2. **Not a certifier.** PolicyCortex is not a C3PAO and does not certify anything. The assessor remains the authority on what passes, and the authorizing official remains the authority on what operates.
3. **Preparation is not a determination.** Readiness tracking and a generated package support review. Meeting the applicable requirements and receiving any required assessment or authorization remain separate responsibilities.
4. **Not a scanner and not a chatbot.** It is an evidence system. The AI inside it can only propose; a policy gate rules before it reasons, a formal proof checks after it drafts, and a rollback identifier exists before anything is touched. Every handler that can change your estate ships a matched captureState and restoreState pair, and the runtime refuses to execute an action whose rollback path is undefined.

How it compares with Vanta, Drata, Wiz, Prisma Cloud, RegScale and GCC High is answered by the same eight questions on [the compare register](https://policycortex.com/compare).

## How to get access and verify it

Request access so we can review your environment and agree on scope and onboarding. After access is approved, a read-only connection in SHADOW mode can produce state records and declared gaps inside your tenant. Nothing executes. Verify the chain yourself: export the stream, recompute SHA3-256 over each record plus the digest of the record before it, and compare.

- **access**: Read only. We do not need write access to show you something.
- **onboarding**: Access is reviewed. Scope and onboarding are agreed with your team.
- **trust.mode**: SHADOW. The reasoning layer proposes and publishes confidence; zero actions are executed.
- **location**: Your tenant, including AWS GovCloud, Azure Government, and GCC High. On-premises delivery for air-gapped environments is available.
- **egress**: None. There is no telemetry pipeline to PolicyCortex servers and no egress of evidence.
- **you.get**: State records, declared gaps, and a chain you can recompute without a PolicyCortex account or API in the loop.

[Request Access](https://app.policycortex.com/auth?mode=request-access) · [Book a founder call](https://policycortex.com/book)

## The vocabulary, defined once

Seven terms the register uses without apology. The same definitions are published for machines in [llms-full.txt](https://policycortex.com/llms-full.txt).

- **Proof of state**: A point-in-time record of what a cloud environment was, captured from the provider APIs, content hashed, chained to the record before it, regenerable to any date inside retention.
- **Proof of change**: Who or what altered the environment, under what authority, with before and after state hashes and a rollback identifier, on a chain that cannot be edited without detection.
- **Proof of agency**: What a machine was permitted to do before it acted, what it actually did, and what would have stopped it one notch different.
- **Declared gap**: An explicit chained entry, with interval and reason, written whenever a collector is down or a scope is unobserved. Absence is recorded, never inferred from fewer rows.
- **Autonomy envelope**: A machine-enforced object read before every autonomous action: allowed and blocked action types, maximum affected resources, minimum published confidence, cost ceiling, excluded environments, change windows, emergency stop. Every evaluation of it is a chained record.
- **Trust modes**: SHADOW (watch only, nothing executes), GATED (default; a named human approves each action and becomes part of its record), AUTONOMOUS (narrow, well-tested action classes, every gate still run on every act).
- **Register**: A page or evidence stream whose visible copy is the input to its own SHA3-256 hash chain, so a second party can recompute it.

## Five questions, answered plainly

**Q: What is PolicyCortex?**
A: PolicyCortex is a compliance and assurance platform for regulated cloud and AI systems. It connects requirements, control implementation, remediation, and verifiable evidence in your tenant, helping your organization prepare for self-assessment, independent assessment, and authorization review, and maintain readiness as systems change.

**Q: Does PolicyCortex make us compliant?**
A: No. It produces the records compliance decisions rest on. The authorizing official, the C3PAO, or the accountable official makes the determination; PolicyCortex hands them evidence they can recompute instead of a narrative they have to believe.

**Q: Where does the data live?**
A: In the customer's own tenant. There is no telemetry pipeline to PolicyCortex servers and no egress of evidence.

**Q: How is evidence verified?**
A: By recomputation. Every record is SHA3-256 hashed over its content plus the digest of the record before it. Export the stream, recompute, compare: intact, or the exact sequence number where integrity fails. No PolicyCortex account or API is needed.

**Q: What happens when a collector is down?**
A: The chain carries a declared gap: the stream, the interval, the reason, and when it was declared. Evidence never silently has fewer rows.

Request access to review your scope and verify the record. [Request Access](https://app.policycortex.com/auth?mode=request-access)

## Register colophon

| Seq | Label | SHA3-256 | Prev |
|---|---|---|---|
| REC 0000 | Genesis | 8130cd095966 | 6183bd2d2a60 |
| REC 0001 | WHO IT IS FOR | e49e56e7bfdd | 8130cd095966 |
| REC 0002 | WHAT IT PRODUCES | aae96b411d1c | e49e56e7bfdd |
| REC 0003 | WHAT IT IS NOT | eb55c3e28edf | aae96b411d1c |
| REC 0004 | HOW YOU EVALUATE IT | 282557b200cd | eb55c3e28edf |
| REC 0005 | GLOSSARY | 25ad8ed615c1 | 282557b200cd |
| REC 0006 | FIVE QUESTIONS | 086c076e79a0 | 25ad8ed615c1 |

Head sha3:086c076e79a0e4a28dd3b66bac4d33a58d5909121febfee25964502a43395622. Each digest is SHA3-256 over the previous digest, the register key, the record label, and the record copy; a second party can recompute it from this document.