SYS:INFERADB // Authorization Infrastructure

Permissions infrastructure
for modern software

Name: InferaDB
Author: InferaDB

Managed authorization infrastructure purpose-built for fine-grained access control — integrates in minutes, scales to millions of checks, and satisfies auditors by default.

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Authorization is a hidden crisis

Broken access control is the #1 risk on the OWASP Top 10 and three of the top five positions on the OWASP API Security Top 10 are authorization failures. Most companies are still building it from scratch.

#1 API security risk: broken access control OWASP Top 10 (2021, 2025) & API Security Top 10 (2023)

$4.88M average cost of a data breach globally IBM Cost of a Data Breach, 2024

$924K annual cost of a 6-person authorization team built in-house Based on avg. US software engineer salary

Authorization that disappears from your stack

Other solutions bolt authorization onto general-purpose databases or embed it in your application code. InferaDB is purpose-built managed infrastructure — permission checks add zero perceptible overhead, audit trails are automatic, and you never think about scaling the authorization layer.

2.8µs p99 read latency Orders of magnitude faster than alternatives

4.9b checks/second Never a bottleneck in your hot path

0.3ms B+ tree index reads Audit trail adds zero overhead

47ms cross-region replication Global consistency, not eventual

Core engine benchmarks. Production latency through InferaDB Cloud includes network round-trip.

GDPR compliant and audit-ready on every plan

Model any permission system

The Infera Policy Language unifies ReBAC, RBAC, and ABAC in a single declarative syntax. Express hierarchies, conditions, and custom logic — then extend with WebAssembly when you need to go further.

schema.ipl

entity organization {
  relation admin: user
  relation member: user
}

entity document {
  relation parent: folder
  relation viewer: user | team#member
  relation editor: user
  relation owner: user

  // Combine relationships, attributes, and modules
  permission view = viewer
    or editor
    or parent.viewer
    or module.check_clearance(context, resource)
  permission edit = editor or owner
  permission delete = owner
}

Define your model

Express entities, relationships, and permissions in IPL. Supports ReBAC, RBAC, ABAC, and custom WebAssembly logic — all in one schema.

Write relationships

Store tuples like (user:alice, editor, document:123) via REST or gRPC. Every change is cryptographically committed to the ledger.

Check permissions

Ask "can user X do Y on resource Z?" and get an answer in microseconds with a full explanation path and revision token for consistency.

audit-trail.json

{
  "decision": "ALLOWED",
  "subject": "user:alice",
  "permission": "edit",
  "resource": "document:roadmap",
  "revision": "r_a1b2c3",
  "latency_us": 2.4,
  "trace": [
    "editor → MATCH (direct)"
  ],
  "hash": "e3b0c44298fc...",
  "prev_hash": "5f2b8d1ca9...",
  "vault": "prod-us-east"
}

Every decision recorded

Each permission check produces a hash-chained audit entry. Tamper-evident, append-only, per-tenant isolation.

Cryptographic proof

Merkle proofs verify that no audit entry has been altered or deleted. Export to your SIEM or compliance toolchain.

Framework-ready compliance

Maps directly to SOC 2, HIPAA, GDPR, PCI DSS, and NIS2 controls. Purpose-built for regulated environments.

Built for the workloads that matter

Multi-Tenant SaaS

Your customers demand per-account permissions, nested teams, and custom roles. InferaDB models arbitrarily complex hierarchies without role explosion — and scales from 10 users to 10 million without re-architecture.

Team-based access control
Customer-managed permissions
Sharing and link access
Permission-aware search

Compliance & Regulation

SOC 2, HIPAA, GDPR, NIS2, DORA, PCI DSS — InferaDB's cryptographic audit trails and data residency controls satisfy regulatory requirements by default, not as an afterthought.

Tamper-proof decision logs
Cryptographic shredding (GDPR Art. 17)
Region-pinned data residency
Merkle proof verification for auditors

AI Agent Authorization

Every AI agent action requires a permission decision. Traditional systems handle 1–2 checks per request. Agent workflows require dozens. InferaDB's microsecond latency makes this tractable.

Per-user RAG scoping
Agent tool authorization
Chain-of-thought permission traces
Microsecond-scale check latency

How InferaDB stacks up

Every approach to authorization has trade-offs. Here's an honest look at what you get with InferaDB versus the alternatives.

Dimension	Built In-House	Policy EnginesOPA / Cedar	Managed ServicesAuthZed / Oso	InferaDB
Setup time	Months	Weeks	Days	Minutes
Latency	Varies	1-10 ms	5-10 ms	~3 µs
Audit trail	Build it yourself	Decision logs only	Audit logging	Full lineage
Tenant isolation	DIY per-tenant	Not built-in	Namespace-level	Native multi-tenant
Compliance readiness	Manual effort	Policy-only	Partial	SOC 2 / HIPAA ready
Ongoing maintenance	Dedicated team	Rego / Cedar upkeep	Vendor-managed	Zero ops
Cost at scale	$900K+ / year	Infra + team	Resource / MAU-based	Usage-based, from $0

Integrate in minutes, not months

REST and gRPC APIs. SDKs for every major language. Branch, test, and merge policies like code. Infrastructure as code from day one.

terminal

$ inferadb check document:1 view user:evan
✓ ALLOWED  2.1ms · revision r_20260314a

$ inferadb simulate \
    --resource document:1 \
    --subject user:evan \
    --trace
✓ ALLOWED via:
  owner → edit → view
  Revision: r_20260314a · Latency: 2.3ms

$ inferadb policy branch feature/new-rule
Branch created: feature/new-rule

$ inferadb policy test
✓ 12 assertions passed
$ inferadb policy merge feature/new-rule
Merged → main

CLI

Check permissions, simulate access, branch and merge policies, run tests, export data. Profile-based auth with OS keychain storage.

main.rs

use inferadb::Client;

let client = Client::builder()
    .url("https://engine.inferadb.com")
    .credentials("client.pem")
    .build().await?;

let result = client
    .vault("production")
    .check("document:1", "view", "user:evan")
    .await?;

if result.permitted {
    // Access granted at revision r_20260314a
}

SDKs

Rust today. Node.js, Go, Python, Java, and .NET coming. Type-safe, async-first, with MockClient and InMemoryClient for testing.

Dashboard

Visual policy editor, relationship graph explorer, decision simulator, and audit log viewer.

Terraform Provider

Manage organizations, vaults, clients, teams, and grants as infrastructure as code.

Framework Integrations

Middleware for Express, Next.js, Rails, Django, Spring, FastAPI, Phoenix, Axum, and more — planned or in development.

Ready to rethink authorization?

Stop building permissions.
Start shipping features.

Replace 6+ engineers and $900K/year of in-house authorization with a managed service that scales from day one.