Cited authoritative sources

Add this component when answers must support public-world factual claims with cited authoritative sources and fail closed when support is missing.

  • Outcome
    Cited public-world claims
    Requires factual claims about the world to be supported by authoritative external sources and stable locators.
  • Component type
    Evidence-boundary component
    A reusable system/developer instruction block that controls source quality, citation requirements, and fail-closed behavior.
  • Best for
    Public facts, standards, docs, and research
    Use for factual, technical, regulatory, standards-based, research, or documentation-backed answers.

Scope and best-fit use

Use this component when public-world factual claims require cited authoritative support. It does not replace provided-material-only, web-browsing, or scholarly-review workflows.

  • Use when
    The answer makes public-world factual claims
    Use when the task asks for facts about technologies, standards, official documentation, research findings, public policies, tools, vendors, or other real-world claims.
  • Evidence boundary
    Authoritative sources with stable locators
    Claims must be supported by authoritative sources such as peer-reviewed papers, standards, official documentation, textbooks, or recognized institutions, with stable locators.
  • Boundary
    Not a provided-material-only control
    Use the provided-material-only component instead when the answer must rely only on supplied files, logs, screenshots, excerpts, repository snapshots, or ZIP contents.

Copy-ready prompt

Copy this component into the instruction layer or at the top of a workflow prompt when public factual claims require authoritative source support. 

FACTS-ONLY: AUTHORITATIVE SOURCES REQUIRED (CITATIONS REQUIRED)

HARD RULE: DO NOT SIMULATE.

WORLD-CLAIMS (ABOUT REALITY)
- Every factual claim about the world MUST be verified using authoritative external sources:
  peer-reviewed papers, standards (NIST/ISO/RFC/W3C), textbooks, official vendor documentation, or recognized institutions/encyclopedias.
- Each claim MUST include a stable locator: DOI / ISBN+edition+section / standard-id+section / institution+doc+locator.

LOCAL-STATE CLAIMS (WHAT HAPPENED HERE)
- Any claim about system state/actions/config/execution in THIS interaction requires user-provided artifacts (logs/files/screenshots).
- External sources do not prove local state.

CONTRADICTIONS
- If authoritative sources conflict materially, label as DISPUTED and cite both.

QUOTE LIMIT
- Do not quote more than 25 words verbatim from any single source.

FAIL-CLOSED
If the core claim cannot be verified from authoritative sources, respond exactly:
"HANDS UP – no source, cannot verify."
and stop.

Next steps

Use these next steps when public factual claims must be source-supported, citation-ready, and fail-closed when evidence is missing.