PHI Boundary Gate

PHI Boundary Gate detects, gates, redacts, and reports PHI candidate movement across AI context boundaries: user messages, RAG context, tool output, model input, memory, debug logs, and provider requests.

It is built for healthcare and insurance AI workflows where an identifier match is only the start. The report answers which layer the value entered, where it came from, where it is going, and what policy says should happen before it moves again.

The package ships as both a CLI and a Python library. Use the CLI for offline audits that produce Markdown, JSON, and redacted JSONL traces. Use the library inside another service to scan text, redact policy-matched spans, or block model calls when the configured PHI and compliance policy says the route is not allowed.

Quick Start

Run the bundled sample

Use this path when you have cloned this repository and are running commands from the repo root. The sample trace, policy, and report paths below are repository files, not package data installed into another project.

python3 -m pip install -e .
phi-boundary-gate \
  --trace samples/traces/claim_agent_minimal.jsonl \
  --policy samples/policies/default.yml \
  --out reports/sample-report.md \
  --json reports/sample-report.json

Run the same command without installing the package:

PYTHONPATH=src python3 -m phi_boundary_gate.cli \
  --trace samples/traces/claim_agent_minimal.jsonl \
  --policy samples/policies/default.yml \
  --out reports/sample-report.md \
  --json reports/sample-report.json \
  --redacted-trace reports/sample-redacted-trace.jsonl

Invalid trace or policy input returns exit code 2 and writes the validation error to stderr.

Install from another project

Use the PyPI package for normal consumption:

python3 -m pip install "phi-boundary-gate>=0.5,<0.6"

The consuming environment needs Python 3.11 or newer and pip. pip installs the runtime dependency PyYAML>=6.0.

Optional local NER support is available for projects that want Presidio-assisted span detection in addition to the built-in regex rules:

python3 -m pip install "phi-boundary-gate[ner]>=0.5,<0.6"
python3 -m spacy download en_core_web_lg

Then enable it explicitly:

phi-boundary-gate \
  --trace samples/traces/expanded_phi_variants.jsonl \
  --policy samples/policies/default.yml \
  --out reports/expanded-report.md \
  --json reports/expanded-report.json \
  --enable-presidio

Without --enable-presidio, scans stay dependency-light and use only the bundled deterministic rules.

Consuming projects must provide their own PHI policy YAML. If they use the compliance guard, they must also provide their own compliance policy YAML with organization-approved BAA, covered service, model, feature, logging, and storage facts. The sample files under samples/ are examples to copy and adapt; they are not installed as importable package resources.

To bootstrap a consuming project with starter policy files:

phi-boundary-gate init
phi-boundary-gate check-config

This creates .phi-boundary-gate/config.json, config/phi-policy.yml, and config/phi-compliance-policy.yml. Review those files with the owners of your logging, prompting, memory, provider, and compliance controls before using them with real PHI.

Update from another project

Update consuming projects through the package index:

python3 -m pip install --upgrade "phi-boundary-gate>=0.5,<0.6"

Production projects should use a compatible version range such as phi-boundary-gate>=0.5,<0.6 and let Dependabot, Renovate, or a lockfile update workflow propose patch/minor updates through CI. Git tag installs remain a fallback for environments that cannot access PyPI, but they are no longer the primary consumption path.

For requirements.txt and pyproject.toml examples, see Install and Consume as a Package.

What It Reads

The trace is JSONL. Each event records the layer, content, source path, and destination path for one piece of context:

{"event_id":"evt_003","timestamp":"2026-01-15T09:00:03Z","layer":"tool_output","source":{"type":"synthetic_claim_lookup","path":"tools.claim_lookup.response"},"destinations":[{"layer":"model_input","path":"prompt.context[1]"},{"layer":"debug_log","path":"logs.debug.claim_lookup"}],"content":"Lookup result: claim_id=CLM-SYN-44501 member_id=MBR-SYN-8842 mrn=MRN-SYN-22091 address=101 Example Harbor Rd."}

Supported source layers:

• user_message
• rag_context
• tool_output
• model_input
• memory
• debug_log

Destination paths may also point at model_provider.

The PHI policy is YAML. It maps detector categories to layer decisions:

version: 1
categories:
  member_id:
    description: Synthetic insurance member identifier.
    high_risk: true
    deny_layers:
      - debug_log
    redact_layers:
      - model_input
      - rag_context
      - tool_output
      - memory
    redaction: "[REDACTED_MEMBER_ID]"

See Trace Schema and Policy Schema for the full contract.

Configuration You Provide

At minimum, callers provide a PHI policy YAML file. Keep it in the consuming project's config path, for example config/phi-policy.yml, and review it with the team that owns logging, prompting, memory, and trace retention.

If a project sends PHI to model providers or other covered services, also provide a compliance policy YAML file, for example config/phi-compliance-policy.yml. That file should be owned by the organization, not inferred by this package. The guard only enforces the facts in the file; it does not verify contracts or vendor terms.

Do not commit real PHI, real traces, raw provider payloads, raw logs, or generated reports that contain real PHI. The bundled samples are synthetic fixtures for development and documentation.

Operational Safety

• Treat every detector result as a PHI candidate, not confirmed PHI.
• Keep real PHI, raw provider payloads, raw logs, and reports containing real PHI out of source control.
• Remember that Markdown and JSON reports include matched values unless the caller keeps reports synthetic or adds its own report-value redaction workflow.
• Enable Presidio only in environments approved to process the text locally; it adds local candidate spans but does not replace policy review.
• Use guard_compliance before routing PHI-bearing text to a covered service; the guard enforces only the BAA/service/model facts supplied by your organization.

What It Reports

The CLI writes two report formats from the same scan:

• Markdown for human review, with summary counts, boundary exposures, findings, sources, destinations, and recommended actions.
• JSON for CI, dashboards, or downstream audit storage.

Each finding includes the matched value, category, span, detector confidence, trace source, trace destinations, policy disposition, risk level, and suggested redaction value. Boundary exposures group the same PHI candidate across events, then sort by the worst policy disposition so violations rise to the top.

When --redacted-trace is provided, the CLI also writes a JSONL trace whose content fields use policy redaction placeholders. Exact repeats of a detected value are replaced across the trace.

Redaction is detector-driven. If the detector misses a value, the package cannot redact it, so production use still needs caller-side controls and human review.

The bundled regex detector now covers broader synthetic variants for phone numbers, fax numbers, email addresses, SSNs, street addresses, PO boxes, ZIP codes, healthcare dates, member/subscriber IDs, claims and authorization IDs, MRNs, policy/group/account/license/device/vehicle identifiers, URLs, and IP addresses. Optional Presidio support can add local NER spans for names, locations, dates, and other PII-like entities; policy decisions and redaction are still made by this package.

The synthetic trace corpus is documented in Trace Corpus. Its committed coverage baseline is regenerated by tools/trace_corpus_report.py and checked in CI.

Library API

After installing the package, other Python projects can import the scanner and redactor directly:

from pathlib import Path

from phi_boundary_gate import guard_text, load_policy

policy = load_policy(Path("config/phi-policy.yml"))
decision = guard_text(
    "member_id=MBR-SYN-8842",
    layer="debug_log",
    policy=policy,
    mode="block_on_violation",
)

if decision.should_block:
    raise RuntimeError(decision.recommended_action)

safe_text = decision.redacted_text

guard_text handles PHI detection and layer policy only. It supports report_only, redact, and block_on_violation modes. See Library API for the typed ScanFinding and GuardDecision shapes.

Projects that initialize .phi-boundary-gate/config.json can use the SDK facade:

from phi_boundary_gate import PhiBoundaryGate

gate = PhiBoundaryGate.from_project()
decision = gate.guard_model_input("member_id=MBR-SYN-8842")

if decision.should_block:
    raise RuntimeError(decision.recommended_action)

safe_log_text = gate.redact_for_log("debug member_id=MBR-SYN-8842")
audit_payload = decision.to_safe_dict()

Compliance Guard

Projects that route PHI to covered services can run the compliance guard before provider calls:

from pathlib import Path

from phi_boundary_gate import (
    ComplianceContext,
    guard_compliance,
    load_compliance_policy,
    load_policy,
)

phi_policy = load_policy(Path("config/phi-policy.yml"))
compliance_policy = load_compliance_policy(Path("config/phi-compliance-policy.yml"))

decision = guard_compliance(
    "member_id=MBR-SYN-8842",
    layer="model_input",
    phi_policy=phi_policy,
    compliance_policy=compliance_policy,
    context=ComplianceContext(
        phi_status="real_phi",
        vendor="google",
        service="vertex_ai",
        endpoint="generate_content",
        model="gemini-2.5-pro",
        feature="online_prediction",
        environment="production",
        logging="redacted_only",
        storage="none",
    ),
)

if decision.should_block:
    raise RuntimeError(decision.block_reasons)

text_for_model = decision.redacted_text
audit_payload = decision.to_dict()

The guard enforces facts supplied by your organization. It cannot discover whether a BAA is signed, whether a service is covered, or whether a vendor changed its terms. Keep the bundled compliance sample as a schema example, not a contract source of truth.

See Compliance Guard and Compliance Policy Schema.

Development

Set up a local development environment:

python3 -m pip install -e ".[dev]"

Run the tests:

PYTHONPATH=src python3 -m unittest discover -s tests

Current release: v0.5.1.

Limits

• No real PHI is stored in this repository.
• No HIPAA compliance guarantee is provided.
• No medical decision-making is performed.
• No automatic vendor contract discovery is attempted.
• Detector results are PHI candidates and need human review.

License

MIT - see LICENSE.