Accountability for AI agents: from code signing to evidence

Organisations are deploying AI agents faster than they can account for what those agents do. Making a person answer for a group of agents often produces accountability theatre: responsibility without control. Drawing on two scenarios from practice, we argue that accountability is first a property of evidence, and set out what should be signed and recorded about agents, and how to keep those records verifiable through the move to post-quantum signatures, under rules that already apply in Europe. We disagree on how many people should supervise how many agents, and explain why. Three regional readings close the paper: Southeast Asia, the Gulf and Jordan, and the European Union. Joint paper. Regulatory status as of 8 October 2026.