McKinsey and Company calls corporations using AI agents “pioneers.” The consulting giant is popularizing the notion among corporate executives that AI agents are not pieces of automated software but “workers,” just like human employees are.

AI agents like Eudamon and Reefwatcher (the bots from Trust Control Ep. 1.0) require quantified, computational, binary and zero trust-based measurements and scores to know whether or not they can trust other agents to exchange data or collaborate on tasks. But now the lines are blurring. A new trust paradigm is unfolding in which the technical trust measures needed by computers and bots are beginning to seep into human ideas of trust. In fact, some people believe we’re already on a trajectory toward continuous machine-readable trust scores. Indeed, some believe that “trust is no longer a feeling.”

Find the full Trust Control documentary series in most podcast apps or listen to this episode here:

• Agentic trust scoring startups
• The demand for continuous, machine readable trust scoring of agentic and human workers
• Questioning assumptions of transparency-based blockchain trustworthiness
• The future of AI agent juries and judges in blockchain dispute resolution “courtrooms”



People Featured in this Episode:

• Kate Kaye, Trust Control creator and narrator
• Michael Fauscette, Founder, CEO and Chief Analyst of Arion Research
• Cemre Çise Kadıoğlu Kumtepe, Assistant Professor, Department of Information and Technology Law, Ankara University, Türkiye

Key References (Mostly) in Order of Appearance

PART ONE

Benchmarking real-time trust scoring across five AI Agent architectures
CleanLab
2025
See also: Handshake acquires CleanLab (2026)

The agentic organization: Contours of the next paradigm for the AI era
McKinsey and Company
2025

State of AI trust in 2026: Shifting to the agentic era
McKinsey ad Company
2026

Building the Digital Workforce
by Michael Fauscette
2025

PART TWO

European Union Digital Services Act
Article 21
2022
See also: Out-of-court dispute settlement bodies under the Digital Services Act (DSA)

Kleros in the Agentic Society: AI Jurors, Kill Switches & the Future of Dispute Resolution
Kleros
2026

Unpacking the technology of trust: establishing trust and fairness in online dispute resolution through blockchain and smart contracts
International Journal of Law and Information Technology
by Cemre Çise Kadıo?lu Kumtepe
2025

Due Process in Blockchain Dispute Resolution Theory and Compliance
by Cemre Çise Kadıo?lu Kumtepe, Assistant Professor, Department of Information and Technology Law, Ankara University, Türkiye 
2026

Unveiling the Kleros Court MCP Server
(see Use Case 1: Automated Due Diligence Agent)
Skywork
2025

Schelling Points: Why Kleros Jurors Converge on the Truth 
Kleros
2026

Thomas Schelling, Nobel Laureate and Longtime RAND Consultant, Dies at 95
Rand
2016

Trust and Suspicion
by Morton Deutsch
Journal of Conflict Resolution
1958

The effect of motivational orientation upon trust and suspicion
by Morton Deutsch
Human Relations
1960

The Strategy of Conflict Prospectus for a Reorientation of Game Theory
by Thomas C. Schelling
The Journal of Conflict Resolution
1958

PART THREE

Evaluations for the agentic world
Agentic AI from QuantumBlack, AI by McKinsey
2026

iTWire TV interview with Lakshmi Hanspal, Digicert
2026

Trust Control Credits
Trust Control was researched, written, edited and produced by Kate Kaye. All interviews with sources featured in Trust Control were conducted by Kate unless otherwise noted.

Fake ads and silly satire were voiced by Kate Kaye and/or Kyle Huth.

Music
The tunes featured throughout Trust Control were written by D. Rives Curtright and performed by the band Epic Strange from Trust Control’s home of Portland, Oregon:

• D. Rives Curtright: guitar, baritone sax, percussion and drum machine
• Charlie Gotgart: bass
• Steven Francisco: midi keys
• Octavio Dowling: keys
• Dave Coniglio: drums and vibraphone
• Mike McGovern: bass on Decimation

Hear the full Epic Strange album, Nouveau Electric Mess on Soundcloud. Hear music from D. Rives Curtright on Spotify.

The work that went into Trust Control was done in Kate Kaye’s personal time and was supported by Oregon State University’s Patricia Valian Reser Center for the Creative Arts fellowship on Trust in the Age of Generative AI and Oregon Humanities.