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Identities are the stable addresses through which Aion surfaces agents and integrations. An identity is not the same thing as a node. A node can participate in multiple roles, and each role may need a different address and permission model.

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Why identities exist

Identities let Aion separate:
  • the implementation of a node
  • the environment in which that node runs
  • the address other systems use to reach it
This separation makes it possible to evolve behavior and configuration without changing the external concept of who or what is being addressed.

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Distribution identities

A distribution-facing identity represents the public entrypoint for a distribution. This is the identity associated with the distribution’s public surface. For an agent-to-agent distribution, that public surface may publish a public agent card that describes the sequence entrypoint. For other network types, such as Twitter, the distribution may still be a public integration point without exposing a public A2A card. In other words, a distribution can be externally reachable without every external route being an agent-card-discoverable A2A surface.

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Daemon identities

A daemon identity represents a node’s direct singular-agent surface. This is the identity used when another agent needs to address the node directly, outside the normal distribution sequence. That daemon surface may expose agent-to-agent, MCP, events, or other capability-specific functionality depending on how the node is configured. The daemon identity is what makes requests like these possible:
  • asking a distribution-backed daemon for extra conversation context
  • invoking a node directly for internal automation
  • exposing node-specific tools without routing through the public sequence

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One node, multiple identities

It is normal for one node to participate in multiple addressable roles. For example, a distribution node may:
  • expose a public distribution identity for external ingress
  • expose a daemon identity for direct internal agent calls
Those are different surfaces with different contracts:
  • the public distribution identity represents the full request path into the sequence
  • the daemon identity represents the node itself as a singular agent

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Cards and identities

The card that gets published depends on which identity and surface are being described.
  • A public distribution card describes the public sequence entrypoint.
  • A component agent card describes the node’s direct singular-agent surface.
That distinction matters because the capabilities and URLs may be different even when both surfaces belong to the same node. See Agent Abstraction, Agent Environments, Distributions, and Daemons for the surrounding concepts.