T06 · System Persistence
Error
- Location
SKILL.md:85- Finding
Recurring Heartbeat Jobs Enable Persistent Autonomous Agent Execution
- Content
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, the . Read WORKING.md. Check Mission Control for @mentions and assigned tasks. If work exists, do it and update WORKING.md. If nothing to do, reply HEARTBEAT_OK." ``` The architecture reference also recommends configuring each independent agent with its own recurring heartbeat: ```text Each heartbeat creates an **isolated session** (one-shot). Avoids always-on costs. ``` ### Technical Analysis The Skill instructs users to register recurring cron jobs that launch isolated agent sessions every 15 minutes. The scheduled instruction authorizes each agent to retrieve work from persistent files and Mission Control and to execute that work without requiring a new user request. Although recurring heartbeats are part of the documented architecture, they create a cross-session persistence mechanism. The scheduled job remains active after the original configuration session ends and repeatedly grants the agent opportunities to use its configured filesystem, shell, browser, and database capabilities. No mandatory expiration, execution budget, approval gate, or removal procedure is included. Consequently, a stale, compromised, or unexpectedly modified task source can continue triggering autonomous activity. ### Attack Path 1. A user follows the Skill and registers the recommended heartbeat cron job. 2. The cron configuration survives the original Skill invocation. 3. Every 15 minutes, OpenClaw creates a new isolated agent session. 4. The scheduled instruction directs the agent to read persistent state and query Mission Control. 5. A malicious, compromised, or incorrectly auth ...[truncated 1015 chars]- Remediation
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