Confused Deputy

In depth

A confused deputy is a program with legitimate authority that gets tricked into using that authority for someone who should not have it. Norm Hardy named the problem in 1988. A compiler had permission to write to its own system directory, and a user gave it the billing file's name as an output path, so it overwrote the billing records. AI agents are textbook confused deputies: they hold the user's credentials and tool access, so an injected instruction can make them act with authority the attacker never had.

Primary source: cap-lore.com