Use this when an action requires human approval before proceeding. Creates an approval request, notifies designated team members, and pauses task execution until approved or rejected. Essential for sensitive operations like publishing content, making purchases, sending mass emails, modifying prod...
Part of the Athenic MCP server. Enforce policies on this tool with Intercept, the open-source MCP proxy.
AI agents call request_approval to retrieve information from Athenic without modifying any data. This is common in research, monitoring, and reporting workflows where the agent needs context before taking action. Because read operations don't change state, they are generally safe to allow without restrictions -- but you may still want rate limits to control API costs.
Even though request_approval only reads data, uncontrolled read access can leak sensitive information or rack up API costs. An agent caught in a retry loop could make thousands of calls per minute. A rate limit gives you a safety net without blocking legitimate use.
Read-only tools are safe to allow by default. No rate limit needed unless you want to control costs.
tools:
request_approval:
rules:
- action: allowSee the full Athenic policy for all 5 tools.
Agents calling read-class tools like request_approval have been implicated in these attack patterns. Read the full case and prevention policy for each:
Other tools in the Read risk category across the catalogue. The same policy patterns (rate-limit, allow) apply to each.
Use this when an action requires human approval before proceeding. Creates an approval request, notifies designated team members, and pauses task execution until approved or rejected. Essential for sensitive operations like publishing content, making purchases, sending mass emails, modifying production systems, or accessing confidential data. Supports urgency levels for prioritization.. It is categorised as a Read tool in the Athenic MCP Server, which means it retrieves data without modifying state.
Add a rule in your Intercept YAML policy under the tools section for request_approval. You can allow, deny, rate-limit, or validate arguments. Then run Intercept as a proxy in front of the Athenic MCP server.
request_approval is a Read tool with low risk. Read-only tools are generally safe to allow by default.
Yes. Add a rate_limit block to the request_approval rule in your Intercept policy. For example, setting max: 10 and window: 60 limits the tool to 10 calls per minute. Rate limits are tracked per agent session and reset automatically.
Set action: deny in the Intercept policy for request_approval. The AI agent will receive a policy violation error and cannot call the tool. You can also include a reason field to explain why the tool is blocked.
request_approval is provided by the Athenic MCP server (maxbeech/athenic). Intercept sits as a proxy in front of this server to enforce policies before tool calls reach the server.
Open source. One binary. Zero dependencies.
npx -y @policylayer/intercept