Threat Modeling System Design AGENTS.md Template

Overview

Direct answer: This AGENTS.md template defines an agent-led threat modeling system design workflow, with explicit roles, orchestrator-led handoffs, memory and source-of-truth rules, and governance for tools and security. It supports both single-agent and multi-agent orchestration.

This AGENTS.md Template for threat modeling system design provides a concrete operating manual for coordinating AI coding agents across the end-to-end threat modeling lifecycle. It documents roles, decision boundaries, memory rules, tool governance, and escalation paths so engineers, security architects, and product teams can reason about the workflow and reliably reproduce outcomes.

When to Use This AGENTS.md Template

• You are designing or expanding a threat modeling workflow that relies on AI coding agents or automation.
• You need explicit handoffs between planners, implementers, reviewers, researchers, and domain specialists.
• You require a single source of truth for design context, decisions, artifacts, and risk conclusions.
• You must implement tool governance, secrets handling, and secure deployment gates in an AI-driven threat modeling environment.
• You want a repeatable operating manual that can scale from a single agent to multi-agent orchestration across teams.

Copyable AGENTS.md Template

# AGENTS.md

Project role: Threat Modeling Architect (Lead for system design and orchestration)

Agent roster and responsibilities:
- Threat Modeler: creates and maintains threat models using STRIDE and MITRE ATT&CK mappings; ensures coverage across assets, data flows, and trust boundaries.
- Threat Intelligence Researcher: sources credible threat intel to enrich threat catalogs and controls mapping.
- Security Reviewer: validates mitigations, traces to controls, and confirms alignment with policy.
- Orchestrator: coordinates tasks, enforces handoffs, preserves context, and logs decisions for traceability.
- Tools Engineer: configures tooling, repositories, secrets handling, and automation hooks.
- Validator: runs test scenarios, ensures artifact quality, and signs off artifacts before release.

Supervisor or orchestrator behavior:
- Maintain a centralized design context (design-ctx) with versioning and provenance.
- Trigger tasks based on design changes, risk shifts, or new intel; enforce explicit handoffs between agents.
- Surface conflicts or ambiguities to human review and escalate high-risk findings.

Handoff rules between agents:
- Planner (Threat Modeler) -> Implementer (Ops/Engineer): deliver actionable threat model changes and mitigation steps.
- Implementer -> Reviewer: submit updated design artifacts with evidence and traceability.
- Reviewer -> Orchestrator: approve, request rework, or escalate.
- Researcher/Domain Specialist -> Planner: feed new threats or domain-specific mitigations for integration.

Context, memory, and source-of-truth rules:
- All decisions and artifacts are stored in design-ctx; use versioned artifacts; memory is scoped to the current threat model design with deltas.
- Source-of-truth: design-ctx, threat catalog, risk register; changes must be traceable to a specific input artifact.

Tool access and permission rules:
- Tools may read/write only in designated repos; secrets must be fetched via a vault with restricted scopes.
- Automated tools cannot deploy changes to production systems without human approval.

Architecture rules:
- Threat model artifacts map to controls; maintain traceability from design to mitigations.
- Use modular components: models, catalogs, risk registers, and handoff records.

File structure rules:
- threat-models/
  - designs/
  - catalogs/
  - artifacts/
- orchestrations/
- tools/
- tests/
- docs/

Data, API, or integration rules:
- Inputs from design docs, asset inventories, and policy references; outputs to risk registers and mitigation plans.
- All external data sources must be authenticated and logged.

Validation rules:
- Confirm coverage of critical assets, data flows, and trust boundaries; ensure mitigations map to at least one control.
- All handoffs produce a traceable artifact with IDs.

Security rules:
- Secrets are never exposed to agents; use least-privilege access and encryption in transit and at rest.
- Audit trails for all changes and escalations.

Testing rules:
- Unit tests for model generation; integration tests for end-to-end threat modeling workflow; regression tests for handoff sequences.

Deployment rules:
- CI/CD gates require successful tests and security reviews before promotion; artifacts must be reviewed by a human prior to production relevance.

Human review and escalation rules:
- Escalate high-risk findings to Security Steering Committee; require signed-off approvals for critical changes.

Failure handling and rollback rules:
- If a threat is misrouted or a mitigations plan proves invalid, rollback to the last known-good design and re-run validations.

Things Agents must not do:
- Never modify unrelated artifacts; do not bypass orchestrator; do not share secrets; do not perform dangerous actions without authorization.

Recommended Agent Operating Model

The workflow assumes a Planner, Implementer, Reviewer, Tester, Researcher, and Domain Specialist with clear decision boundaries and escalation paths. The Orchestrator oversees multi-agent coordination, ensures context consistency, and handles handoffs. Decision boundaries are explicit: planners decide what to change, implementers execute changes within defined guardrails, reviewers validate, testers verify, researchers augment, and domain specialists provide expertise. Escalation paths route high-risk findings to human review and governance.

Recommended Project Structure

threat-modeling-system/
  designs/
  catalogs/
  artifacts/
  models/
  workflows/
  orchestrations/
  tools/
  tests/
  docs/

Core Operating Principles

• Single source of truth for design context.
• Explicit, auditable handoffs between agents.
• Memory scoped to the current design with versioning.
• Least-privilege tool access and secure secret handling.
• Deterministic outputs and testable artifacts.

Agent Handoff and Collaboration Rules

• Planner to Implementer: include a clearly defined set of changes with traceability IDs.
• Implementer to Reviewer: attach evidence and test results; address reviewer notes before moving forward.
• Researcher pushes domain intel to Planner for potential incorporation.
• Domain Specialist contributes specialized mitigations through the Orchestrator.
• The Orchestrator validates final handoffs and enforces escalation when needed.

Tool Governance and Permission Rules

• Commands must originate from approved agents and be logged.
• Secrets accessed via vaults; never embedded in code or context.
• Production system changes require human approval and rollback capability.
• External integrations must be authenticated and restricted by scopes.

Code Construction Rules

• Artifacts are versioned; do not overwrite existing designs without a new version.
• All code-gen or model-generated content must be traceable to inputs.
• Tests cover edge cases in threat modeling scenarios and handoffs.
• Avoid duplicating work; reuse threat catalogs and templates where possible.

Security and Production Rules

• Never expose secrets; use secret management in all environments.
• Ensure threat model outputs do not leak sensitive details to non-authorized agents.
• Logging, monitoring, and anomaly detection are mandatory for production-sensitive workflows.

Testing Checklist

• Unit tests for model generation and handoffs
• Integration tests for multi-agent orchestration
• End-to-end threat modeling workflow validation
• Security and access control tests

Common Mistakes to Avoid

• Skipping explicit handoffs and context sharing between agents
• Over-privileging agents or exposing secrets in memory
• Unclear ownership of design artifacts
• Assuming generation implies correctness without validation

Related implementation resources: AI Use Case for Corporate Event Managers Using Slack To Orchestrate Day-Of Venue Tasks Across Multi-Department Teams and AI Use Case for Content Marketers Using Wordpress To Auto-Translate Blog Posts Into Multiple Languages.

FAQ

What is the purpose of this AGENTS.md Template for threat modeling system design?

This template defines roles, handoffs, and governance rules for AI coding agents in a threat modeling workflow.

How does this template support multi-agent orchestration?

It specifies roles, memory, and orchestrator behavior to coordinate planners, implementers, reviewers, researchers, and domain specialists with explicit handoffs.

What are the key handoff rules between agents?

Planner ➜ Implementer to deliver changes; Implementer ➜ Reviewer for validation; Reviewer ➜ Orchestrator for approval or escalation.

How is memory and source-of-truth managed?

All decisions live in a central design-ctx with versioning; design-ctx is the source of truth and is referenceable by all agents.

What about security and deployment in this workflow?

Secrets are protected via vaults, tool access is restricted, and production changes require human oversight and rollback capabilities.