Who is liable when an agent commits its principal to something false or binding?

No settled answer exists. The ledger poses the question, links the live debate, and does not answer it.

Record ID

AIL-2026-0034

Kind

Open question

Jurisdiction

Global

Last verified

15 September 2026

Added

15 September 2026

• The Canadian tribunal decision is a small claims level decision and is not binding precedent on other courts.
• The German appellate decision was decided under unfair competition law and the court allowed a further appeal because the attribution question is new.
• Both decided cases concern statements that misled, not agreements the agent formed on its principal's behalf.
• This ledger found no published decision holding that an agent's output concluded a contract binding its principal.
• The European Union's proposed dedicated AI liability instrument was withdrawn, leaving product liability and ordinary civil law to carry the question.

Accountability, Delegation. Stated means the document you can open below says it; silent means the ledger read the document and it does not.

AccountabilityReported

Two tribunals have placed responsibility on the deploying company, which is the strongest published answer available and is not yet settled law.Justiz NRW, Oberlandesgericht Hamm press release on case 4 UKl 3/25, primary source, 12 May 2026.

DelegationOpen

No decision found here defines the scope of authority a principal grants an agent, which is the question contract law would need answered.McCarthy Tetrault, Moffatt v. Air Canada and misrepresentation by chatbot, secondary source, 19 February 2024.

Assume you are bound by what your agent says, because that is how both decided cases came out. Then reduce what it can say: ground policy answers in published text, forbid the agent from offering terms, prices, refunds or eligibility it cannot quote, and keep every transcript. The cheapest control here is limits, and the record you keep is what decides the dispute.

1. Justiz NRW, Oberlandesgericht Hamm press release on case 4 UKl 3/25Primary · 12 May 2026
2. McCarthy Tetrault, Moffatt v. Air Canada and misrepresentation by chatbotSecondary · 19 February 2024

• Reported, primary not reachedFabricationAIL-2026-0029

  A tribunal held an airline to what its chatbot told a passenger, rejecting the argument that the bot was a separate entity

  Canada · verified 15 September 2026

  The passenger asked the airline's website chatbot about bereavement fares and was told he could apply for the discount after flying, which the published policy did not allow.

• VerifiedFabricationAIL-2026-0030

  A German appellate court held a company to specialist titles its chatbot invented, and allowed a further appeal

  European Union · verified 15 September 2026

  The court's press release records that the chatbot told users the company's two doctors held several specialist titles, including titles that do not exist.

• Open questionOpen questionAIL-2026-0033

  Is an operator anywhere required to report that an agent acted beyond its authority?

  European Union · verified 15 September 2026

  Article 73 requires providers of high risk AI systems placed on the Union market to report any serious incident to the market surveillance authorities of the member states where it occurred.

• AbsentOpen questionAIL-2026-0037

  Has a confirmation prompt ever been documented stopping a destructive agent action in a real incident?

  Global · verified 15 September 2026

  Every incident record in this dataset that involves a destructive or irreversible action records human approval as absent, bypassed or uninformed.

• Open questionOpen questionAIL-2026-0036

  Does any published standard require an agent to hold an identity distinct from the person it acts for?

  Global · verified 15 September 2026

  The Model Context Protocol authorization specification states that clients must implement resource indicators for OAuth so that a token names the resource it is for.

• Open questionOpen questionAIL-2026-0035

  Does any registry classify AI incidents by the authority control that failed, and does anyone count agent incidents?

  Global · verified 15 September 2026

  The AI Incident Database describes itself as indexing the collective history of harms or near harms realised in the real world by deployed AI systems.