VERIFICATION · DRAFT v0.3

What verification means

Verification is what separates a standard from a guess. A schema is only useful if you can show it is accurate and current — so every GovSchema document carries an explicit verification record and a lifecycle status, never a footnote.

How verification works

A published schema is confirmed against the live government source; the check is written into the document's verification record; and its lifecycle status states how much has been verified — so an agent can decide how far to trust it.

  1. Live government source
  2. Checked by a verification practice
  3. Verification record
  4. Agents rely on the status

The verification record

Every document carries a verification object recording how and when it was confirmed against the live source. It states the method — the identifier of the verification practice used — and lastVerifiedAt, the date the schema was last checked, and may add verifiedBy, nextReviewBy, and explanatory notes. A schema authored from a source review but not yet independently re-verified says so honestly in its notes and stays at lifecycle status draft; when a full field-by-field review is performed under an adopted practice, the document advances — in a new version — to status verified.

Lifecycle status takes one of three values: a document is draft while it is being prepared or has not yet been independently verified, verified once a current verification record confirms it matches the live source, and deprecated when the source process changes or is retired. Deprecated documents are retained for reproducibility, never deleted.

json A verification record on a draft schema, stating its claim honestly 
"verification": {
  "method": "manual-source-review-v1",
  "lastVerifiedAt": "2026-06-30",
  "nextReviewBy": "2026-12-30",
  "notes": "Source-derived structural reference; independent field-by-field review pending."
}

Verification practices

A verification practice is a documented, repeatable method for confirming that a published schema still matches the live government source it describes. The specification fixes only the shape of the verification claim so consumers can read it uniformly; a practice defines the how — what makes a source authoritative, how each field and the flow are compared against the live form, how often a schema is re-checked, and how a discrepancy is recorded and resolved.

Resolution follows the immutability rule: a discrepancy is fixed by shipping a new version, not by editing a published one. Each registry entry keeps a VERIFICATION.md source-review record alongside the document, documenting exactly what was confirmed against the source and what is not yet independently verified.

The verification methodology is at v0.1 and being drafted in the open. Re-verification cadence is risk-based: fee- or policy-sensitive processes such as passport renewal are re-checked at least every six months and whenever the source URL changes.

Honest by default

GovSchema never claims more certainty than it has earned. A schema that has not been independently re-verified says so, in machine-readable form, so an agent and the person it acts for can decide how much to rely on it.