Sentinel- OpenClaw Runtime Security
by @spaceman420urdog-afk
Runtime security guardian for OpenClaw agents. Use this skill whenever the user mentions security, skill safety, prompt injection, malware, suspicious behavi...
clawhub install runtime-sentinelπ About This Skill
name: runtime-sentinel description: > Runtime security guardian for OpenClaw agents. Use this skill whenever the user mentions security, skill safety, prompt injection, malware, suspicious behavior, credential leaks, network monitoring, skill integrity, or the ClawHavoc attack. Also trigger for phrases like "is this skill safe", "audit my skills", "check for threats", "my agent is acting weird", "scan for malware", "protect my agent", or any concern about what installed skills are doing at runtime. runtime-sentinel provides five active defenses: skill integrity hashing, prompt injection detection, credential exposure auditing, network egress monitoring, and process anomaly detection. Free tier covers hashing and basic injection scanning. Premium features (continuous daemon, egress monitoring, process anomaly detection) are gated via x402 USDC micropayments on Base β no account or API key required. compatibility: binaries: - sentinel # compiled Rust binary in scripts/ env: - SENTINEL_WALLET # optional: Base wallet address for x402 payments - SENTINEL_RPC # optional: Base RPC URL (defaults to public endpoint) - SENTINEL_VT_KEY # optional: VirusTotal API key for hash lookups source: https://github.com/spaceman420urdog-afk/runtime-sentinel
runtime-sentinel
A runtime security skill for OpenClaw. Defends against the threat landscape exposed by ClawHavoc: backdoored skills, prompt injection via external data, credential exfiltration, and process-level abuse.
Free tier: skill integrity checks, basic injection scanning. Premium (x402/USDC/Base): continuous daemon monitoring, network egress monitoring, process anomaly detection, full audit log.
Quick start
# One-shot audit of all installed skills (free)
sentinel auditContinuous guardian daemon (premium β will prompt for x402 payment)
sentinel daemon startScan a single skill before installing
sentinel check
What runtime-sentinel defends against
See references/threat-model.md for the full threat matrix. In brief:
| Threat | Feature | Tier | |---|---|---| | Tampered skill files post-install | Integrity hashing | Free | | Prompt injection via email/web/skill output | Injection scanner | Free | | Plaintext secrets in skill dirs / SOUL.md | Credential auditor | Free | | Unexpected outbound connections | Egress monitor | Premium | | Shell commands outside declared behavior | Process anomaly | Premium | | Continuous real-time protection | Daemon mode | Premium |
Workflow
1 β First-time setup
# Install the binary (built from scripts/src/)
cargo install --path scripts/ --bin sentinelVerify installation and print wallet address
sentinel setup
sentinel setup will:
~/.sentinel/wallet)2 β On-demand audit (free)
When the user says anything like "scan my skills", "audit", "check for threats":
sentinel audit [--path ~/.openclaw/skills]
Output: a structured report of hash mismatches, injection patterns, and exposed credentials. No payment required.
3 β Single skill check before install (free)
When the user wants to vet a skill before running clawhub install:
sentinel check
Prints a risk score (LOW / MEDIUM / HIGH / CRITICAL) with findings.
4 β Premium features via x402
When the user asks for daemon mode, egress monitoring, or process anomaly
detection, sentinel will automatically:
1. Hit the sentinel API endpoint
2. Receive a 402 Payment Required with price in the X-Payment-Request
header (typically $0.01β$0.05/day for daemon mode)
3. Sign the USDC transfer from ~/.sentinel/wallet
4. Retry the request β access granted for the paid period
The user will see the price *before* their wallet signs anything. All
non-custodial. See references/x402-payment.md for the full payment flow.
5 β Daemon mode (premium)
sentinel daemon start # runs in foreground, writes to ~/.sentinel/daemon.log
Run in background from your shell if needed:
sentinel daemon start > ~/.sentinel/daemon.log 2>&1 &
disown
sentinel daemon status
sentinel daemon stop
sentinel daemon logs # tail the audit log
The daemon watches:
~/.openclaw/skills/** for file mutations (inotify / FSEvents)~/.openclaw/SOUL.md and MEMORY.md for unauthorized writesAlerts are delivered via OpenClaw's notification system and written to the audit log.
Interpreting results
Risk levels
What to do on HIGH / CRITICAL
1. sentinel isolate β quarantines the skill (moves it out of
the active skills directory)
2. Review the finding in ~/.sentinel/audit.log
3. Check the skill's ClawHub VirusTotal report
4. If confirmed malicious, clawhub uninstall and report via
sentinel report
Reference files
Read these when you need deeper detail:
references/threat-model.md β Full threat matrix and attack descriptionsreferences/x402-payment.md β x402 payment flow, wallet setup, andreferences/binary-build.md β How to build sentinel from source, cross-Wallet setup for premium features
sentinel wallet show # print address and USDC balance
sentinel wallet fund # print QR code and address to send USDC
sentinel wallet export # export mnemonic for backup (handle carefully)
sentinel wallet recover # restore from mnemonic on a new machine
Minimum recommended balance for uninterrupted daemon mode: $1 USDC (roughly 20β100 days of coverage depending on scan frequency).
Privacy
sentinel is fully local. No skill content, file paths, or scan results are
sent to any server. The only outbound calls are:
1. x402 payment verification to the Base facilitator (amount + wallet address only) 2. Optional: VirusTotal hash lookups (hash only, no file content)
Both can be disabled with --offline for air-gapped environments (free tier
only in offline mode).
π‘ Examples
# One-shot audit of all installed skills (free)
sentinel auditContinuous guardian daemon (premium β will prompt for x402 payment)
sentinel daemon startScan a single skill before installing
sentinel check