Directory basics
What is the ASG Directory?
The ASG Directory is a public business discovery system that organizes published
business records, services, products, locations, public agent capabilities and
machine-readable profile information. It is designed for people, developers, search
systems and compatible AI agents.
Who can use the ASG Directory?
Visitors can search the public Directory, business owners can claim or correct
appropriate records, developers can use supported public read APIs, and compatible AI
systems can consume public machine-readable profile data.
Is searching the Directory free?
Yes. Public search, public profile viewing and supported public read endpoints can be
used without purchasing a business plan.
Is listing a business free?
A business can begin with the public submission or claim workflow without a paid plan.
Optional services, agentic capabilities or commercial products can remain separate from
the free public Directory record.
How does a business enter the Directory?
A record can be discovered from public information, submitted by a business, or
connected through supported WebsDocs or ASG systems. The listing origin is separate from
registry verification, owner control and Directory Score.
What is a discovered listing?
A discovered listing is a public business record created from information the Directory
identified from public sources. Discovery does not mean the business owner has claimed
the profile, and it does not automatically mean the business is registry verified.
What is a published listing?
A published listing is a record available through the public Directory. Publication
controls public visibility. It is independent from owner claim status, business registry
verification and optional paid services.
What is a claimed listing?
A claimed listing is a profile for which an owner or authorized representative has
entered the ownership-control workflow. Claiming is about profile control. It is not the
same thing as verifying that the legal business exists in an external registry.
Can a business appear before its owner creates an account?
Yes. The Directory can publish a discovered business record before an owner registers or
claims it. This allows public business discovery to grow independently from owner
onboarding.
Why are discovery, claim and verification separate?
They answer different questions. Discovery asks whether a public business record can be
identified. Business Registry Verification asks whether supported registry evidence
matches the business. Claim and owner verification ask whether a person or account
controls the Directory profile.
What is the Directory Score?
The Directory Score is a public-data quality and readiness indicator. It can reflect
completeness, evidence strength, freshness and supported public discovery signals. It is
separate from Business Registry Verification.
Does a high Directory Score mean a business is legally verified?
No. A high Directory Score can indicate a strong public profile even when registry
verification is still pending. Registry verification has its own status, level and
evidence fields.
Does registry verification automatically increase Directory Score?
Registry evidence can contribute to the overall strength of a public record where the
scoring model uses it, but the two concepts remain separate. The Directory should be
able to explain both the record quality and the registry-verification state
independently.
What does Recently added mean?
Recently added refers to businesses that were newly published or introduced into the
public Directory within a recent period. It is a publication and discovery signal, not a
registry-verification badge.
Can a business be removed or corrected?
Appropriate users can submit correction or removal requests. The Directory can also
refresh records when newer public evidence becomes available. Registry verification does
not prevent a legitimate correction, review or removal workflow.
Discovery, geography and listing management
What is the Discovery Engine?
The ASG Directory Discovery Engine is the crawlable country-and-category
publishing layer of the Directory. It organizes eligible public profiles into canonical
discovery collections that people, search engines, crawlers and compatible AI systems can
browse. It complements the live Directory explorer rather than replacing it.
How is the Discovery Engine different from Directory search?
Directory search is an interactive way to find a specific business, service, product,
location or AI-ready profile. The Discovery Engine publishes stable country and category
collection pages so users and machines can browse the public business graph through
crawlable links.
How does the Directory discover businesses?
The Directory can identify businesses from publicly accessible business,
website and structured information. Discovered records remain distinct
from owner-claimed and registry-verified business profiles.
How do I claim my business?
Use the Directory claim workflow from the relevant business profile or
owner action. Owner or profile-control verification is separate from the
public business registry verification shown on Directory profiles.
How do I correct business information?
Business owners, authorized representatives and other appropriate users
can submit a correction request when public listing information is
inaccurate or outdated.
How can I request removal of a listing?
The Directory provides a removal request workflow for appropriate cases.
Requests can be reviewed before a public record is changed or removed.
Why is a company shown as Global?
Global placement is used when a company cannot yet be tied confidently to
a Directory country placement, when location information is insufficient,
or when the business is intentionally represented without a single
geographic placement.
How is a country assigned to a company?
Country placement is based on the public location information associated
with the Directory listing. Records without sufficient country information
can remain in Global mode.
Can a company operate in more than one country?
Yes. Businesses may operate internationally. The Directory can still use a
primary country placement for discovery while public profile information
describes wider operating coverage where available.
How often is public business information refreshed?
Directory information can be refreshed as new public data, business
updates and supported activity become available. Different records may
therefore have different update times.
Can businesses control or update their public listing?
Business owners and authorized representatives can use supported claim and
correction workflows to request control or changes to their public
Directory information.
How are incorrect or outdated records handled?
Public records can be refreshed from newer information, and users can
submit correction requests when a listing contains inaccurate or outdated
business information.
How can I contact the Directory about a listing?
Use the relevant claim, correction, removal or support workflow associated
with the listing. Providing the business URL, listing reference and clear
details about the request helps the Directory review the issue.
Directory Score and public discovery signals
What affects the Directory Score?
The score can reflect factors such as the completeness, quality,
discoverability and freshness of public business information and other
supported public readiness signals.
Does a high Directory Score mean a business is endorsed?
No. The Directory Score is a public-data quality and readiness indicator.
It is not a recommendation, guarantee or general endorsement of a
business, product or service.
What is the live discovery globe showing?
The globe visualizes public Directory country coverage, mapped public
companies, Global companies and supported recent public activity across
the Directory network.
What do the globe colors and markers mean?
Globe markers distinguish Directory geography and business placement such as
country placement and Global companies. The legend beside the globe shows
the meaning of the active visual layers.
What are recent movements on the globe?
Recent movements visualize supported recent public Directory activity
between available locations or business points. They are a discovery
visualization rather than private tracking data.
AI-readable listings and active agents
What are active agent profiles?
Active agent profiles are published businesses with a live AIG seller
gateway. They may support reasoning, agent messaging, commerce or other
declared capabilities. A static AI-readable listing is not automatically active.
Can AI agents use the Directory?
Yes. Every published listing can expose static machine-readable profile,
company JSON, llms.txt, Agent Card and schema links for discovery. Live
interactions are available only when the business has an active AIG gateway.
What information can AI agents access?
Supported agents can use information intentionally exposed through the
public Directory, such as public business profiles, services, products,
capabilities and supported public endpoints.
What does agent-ready mean?
AI-readable means compatible agents can discover the public business facts.
Agent active is a separate status for businesses with supported live AIG
capabilities.
Can a business publish agent capabilities?
Supported businesses can expose public capabilities that help compatible
agents understand what the business offers and how supported interactions
can be performed.
Is every AI-readable listing an active agent?
No. A published listing can expose static machine-readable business facts for discovery
without operating a live agent. Active agent status is shown separately and applies only
when a business has a supported live AIG gateway or another explicitly declared active
capability. Static discovery alone does not imply live reasoning, messaging, A2A, MCP,
UCP, checkout or autonomous action.
Do all active agents support the same interactions?
No. Each active profile should declare its own public capabilities and supported routes.
One business may support approved answers or agent messaging, while another may also
support commerce, workflow actions or human escalation. Visitors and compatible agents
should rely on the published capability fields rather than assuming every active agent
can perform every action.
Website Audit and public analytics
What do the Directory analytics measure?
Public analytics can summarize signals such as listing growth, country
coverage, discovered businesses, published listings, active agents,
successful crawls and Directory quality trends.
What does Website Audit inspect?
Website Audit checks publicly accessible website and machine-discovery
information and presents readiness findings without exposing private
crawler records.
Does Website Audit access private website data?
Website Audit is designed around publicly accessible website information.
It does not require private administrative access to perform the public
readiness checks shown in the Directory.
What public technical files can Website Audit check?
Website Audit can report supported public machine-discovery and technical
files exposed by a website, together with other publicly accessible
readiness signals used by the audit.
Developer access and public-data boundaries
Can developers access Directory data through an API?
Yes. The Developer Center can expose supported public read endpoints for
developers who want to work with published Directory data
programmatically.
What data is available through public API endpoints?
Available endpoints can expose supported public Directory information such
as published listings, discovery data, public analytics and other
machine-readable resources presented by the Developer Center.
Does the Directory expose private crawler logs?
No. Public Directory views and analytics are intended to expose useful
public summaries and discovery information rather than private raw crawler
records.
Does the Directory expose private business information?
The public Directory is designed around information appropriate for public
business discovery. Private credentials, private administrative data and
other non-public information are not intended to be presented as public
listing content.
Business Registry Verification
What is ASG Business Registry Verification?
ASG Business Registry Verification is a separate trust layer that checks whether a
public Directory business can be matched to supported registry or authority evidence. It
is designed to establish business-level confidence without requiring the owner to claim
the profile first.
Why was Business Registry Verification separated from owner verification?
A business can legally exist before anyone claims its Directory profile. Keeping the
layers separate lets ASG verify the business record from registry evidence while
independently verifying profile control when an owner later claims or activates access.
What question does Business Registry Verification answer?
It answers: does supported external business-registry or authority evidence match this
public business record strongly enough to assign a registry verification level? It does
not answer who currently controls the Directory account.
What question does owner verification answer?
Owner verification answers whether a person, account, email, domain or supported control
method is authorized to control the Directory profile. That process remains independent
from business-registry verification.
Can an unclaimed business be registry verified?
Yes. That is one of the main reasons the verifier exists. A public business can be Gold
or Green registry verified while its owner status remains unclaimed.
Can a claimed business remain not registry verified?
Yes. Claiming a profile proves or establishes control through the owner workflow. It
does not automatically create registry evidence. The profile can therefore be claimed
while registry verification remains pending, unavailable or evidence-only.
Can both layers be verified at the same time?
Yes. A mature profile can have qualifying business-registry verification and separate
owner or profile-control verification. The Directory keeps both facts instead of
collapsing them into one ambiguous badge.
What sources can the verifier use?
The verifier can use supported national or regional business registries,
authority-specific adapters, global legal-entity references, structured registry
evidence and other configured authoritative business sources. The exact source depends
on jurisdiction and available authority coverage.
Does the verifier only use one global database?
No. Jurisdictions differ. The verification layer is designed to route a business to the
most appropriate configured authority or adapter, then use supported fallback evidence
when a direct authority integration is not available.
What is authority routing?
Authority routing is the process of selecting the most appropriate registry or
verification adapter for a business based on jurisdiction, country, available
identifiers and configured authority coverage.
What is a registry adapter?
A registry adapter is the verification component that knows how to query or interpret a
specific supported authority or registry interface. Different countries and authorities
can require different request formats, identifiers and evidence handling.
What happens when a direct authority is not available?
The verifier can keep the business pending, use supported fallback evidence where
configured, or assign an evidence-only state when the available information is useful
but not strong enough to count as verified.
Does the verifier invent registry data?
No. Verification should be based on evidence returned by supported authorities,
registries or configured evidence sources. Missing evidence should remain missing,
pending or non-qualifying rather than being fabricated.
Does the verifier change the public business name automatically?
Registry data can provide a registered legal name or corroborating identity evidence,
but the Directory can keep display-name and legal-name concepts separate. Public
corrections and normalization rules still apply.
What is the registered legal name field?
When available, the verifier can retain the legal name returned by the supporting
registry or authority. This can be exposed separately from the public display name so
users and machines can distinguish brand presentation from legal identity.
What is a registry ID?
A registry ID is an identifier supplied by or associated with a supported business
authority. The Directory can expose it when appropriate so the verification basis is
more transparent.
What is an authority code?
An authority code identifies the registry, authority or configured verification source
used for the business check. It helps systems understand where the registry evidence
came from.
What is a jurisdiction?
Jurisdiction identifies the legal or registry context in which the business was checked.
It can correspond to a country or another configured registry jurisdiction.
What is a registry status?
Registry status is the status returned or derived from the supported authority evidence,
such as whether the business appears active, registered or otherwise recognized by that
registry. The exact vocabulary can vary by source.
What is a match score?
The match score represents how strongly the authority result and Directory business
record correspond under the verifier's matching logic. It can consider names,
identifiers, jurisdiction and other supported evidence. It is not a consumer rating.
Is the match score the same as Directory Score?
No. Match score concerns the quality of a registry match. Directory Score concerns the
strength and readiness of the public Directory record. They serve different purposes.
What does checked at mean?
Checked at records when the verifier last evaluated the business against its configured
registry or authority path.
What does verified at mean?
Verified at records when a business reached a qualifying registry-verification state. It
can differ from the most recent check time if the verifier later rechecks the record.
What does next check at mean?
Next check at indicates when the verification system plans or is eligible to evaluate
the business again. Rechecks help the Directory avoid treating old evidence as
permanently current.
Can registry verification change over time?
Yes. A business can move between pending, evidence-only, verified or non-qualifying
states when registry information, authority responses, identifiers or matching evidence
change.
What happens when a registry is temporarily unavailable?
A temporary authority failure should not be treated as proof that the business does not
exist. The verifier can keep or schedule the record for a later check and distinguish
temporary upstream failure from a genuine negative result.
What happens when an authority requires credentials?
Authority-specific adapters can use configured server-side credentials or API keys.
These credentials are not public Directory data and should never be exposed in public
profile responses.
Does verification expose private credentials?
No. Public verification responses can expose public-safe evidence such as authority
name, registry ID, level or check time, but private API credentials, secrets and
internal authentication data remain server-side.
Can verification run before an owner account exists?
Yes. Business Registry Verification belongs to the public business record, not to the
owner account lifecycle. This lets the Directory build business trust at discovery
scale.
Can registry verification be re-run after an owner claims the business?
Yes. Owner activation does not freeze registry evidence. The verifier can continue to
refresh the business-level verification state independently.
Does a business have to pay to be registry verified?
The registry-verification state is a Directory trust and evidence function, not a
paid-profile entitlement. Commercial services can remain separate from whether the
public business record qualifies for registry verification.
Does ASG sell verification badges?
The verification level should reflect supported evidence and policy, not payment. A paid
relationship should not by itself convert a business into Gold or Green.
Is Business Registry Verification an endorsement?
No. Registry verification indicates that supported registry evidence matched the
business record under the Directory's verification policy. It does not guarantee product
quality, solvency, safety, licensing for every activity or future conduct.
Is Business Registry Verification a credit check?
No. It is not a credit score, financial rating or creditworthiness assessment.
Is Business Registry Verification legal advice?
No. The Directory presents public registry and verification signals for discovery. Users
should rely on appropriate professional or official sources for legal decisions.
Does registry verification guarantee that every public field is correct?
No. Registry verification supports business identity confidence. Other profile fields
such as marketing descriptions, products, services, locations or website content can
change independently and may need separate evidence or correction.
Can registry evidence conflict with website information?
Yes. A website can use a trading name, brand or old address while a registry uses a
legal name or registered address. The verifier and Directory can keep these signals
separate instead of forcing every field to become identical.
How are conflicting identities handled?
When evidence is inconsistent, the verifier can reduce confidence, keep the record
pending, preserve evidence for later review or avoid assigning a qualifying level until
the conflict is resolved.
Can a business have more than one registry identifier?
Yes. Some businesses can have multiple identifiers across authorities, jurisdictions or
legal-entity systems. The Directory can retain the primary supported identifier and
related evidence without pretending the identifiers are interchangeable.
Does verification depend only on the website domain?
No. Domain evidence can help connect a public web presence to a business, but Business
Registry Verification is designed around registry and authority evidence rather than
domain control alone.
Does a matching domain prove the legal entity?
Not by itself. Domain control is useful for owner or profile-control workflows and as
supporting evidence, but a legal-business verification level should rely on the
configured registry-verification policy.
Does the verifier verify people?
No. The Business Verification layer verifies the business record and registry evidence.
Personal identity or owner-control verification belongs to separate workflows.
Does the verifier verify beneficial ownership?
Not by default. A business registry may expose information relevant to ownership, but
the ASG business-verification level should not be interpreted as a beneficial-owner
verification unless a specific supported process says so.
Does the verifier verify licenses and permits?
Not automatically. Business existence in a registry does not prove every sector-specific
license or permit. Specialized licensing evidence would need its own supported authority
and policy.
Can a sole trader or small business be verified?
Where the relevant jurisdiction and configured authority provide sufficient business
evidence, smaller entities can be evaluated under the same evidence-first principles.
Availability depends on what the authority exposes.
Can an international company be verified?
Yes when the verifier has supported authority coverage or reliable configured evidence
for the relevant jurisdiction. Coverage can differ by country and registry.
What does pending authority mean?
Pending authority means the business has entered the verification workflow but the
system still needs an authority response, a follow-up check or sufficient qualifying
evidence.
What does not applicable mean?
Not applicable means the business-registry verification badge is intentionally not used
for that entity under current policy. Government entities are the clearest example
because they belong to a different classification and trust model.
Why does the Directory keep verification history or check records?
Verification history helps the system understand when checks occurred, what evidence
path was used and how a record reached its current state. Public responses can remain
concise while internal auditability is preserved.
Can verification be revoked?
A qualifying state can be removed or downgraded if later evidence shows that the
previous match is no longer valid, the registry status changes or the record no longer
meets verification policy.
Can a business challenge a verification result?
A business owner or appropriate representative can use supported correction or review
channels when the public record or verification evidence appears wrong. A challenge
should not be resolved by simply forcing a badge.
What if two Directory listings appear to match the same legal business?
Duplicate or conflicting records should be normalized, reviewed or merged according to
Directory policy. Registry identifiers can help detect those situations, but the system
should avoid silently attaching one legal identity to unrelated public profiles.
Verification levels
What are the Business Registry Verification levels?
The public verification model uses Gold, Green, Blue and None. Gold and Green count as
registry verified. Blue means registry evidence exists but is not strong enough to count
as verified. None means no qualifying registry verification is currently assigned.
What does Gold mean?
Gold means Full Registry Verified. The business has reached the strongest supported
registry-verification state under the current policy and counts as a verified business.
What does Green mean?
Green means Registry Verified. The business has qualifying registry evidence and counts
as verified, while the evidence path or authority context can differ from Gold.
What does Blue mean?
Blue means Registry Evidence. Useful registry or authority evidence exists, but the
record does not count as fully registry verified under the current policy.
Does Blue count as verified?
No. Blue is deliberately excluded from the verified total. This prevents the Directory
from inflating verification numbers when the evidence is useful but incomplete.
Does None mean the business is fake?
No. None only means the record does not currently have a qualifying
registry-verification level. The business can still be real, newly discovered, awaiting
an authority check or located in a jurisdiction with limited verification coverage.
Why have both Gold and Green if both count as verified?
They allow the Directory to distinguish the strongest full-registry confirmation from
another qualifying verified state without collapsing different evidence strengths into
one generic badge.
Can Gold become Green?
Yes. Verification can be re-evaluated. If the available evidence changes or a later
check supports a different qualifying level, the public level can change while remaining
verified.
Can Green become Gold?
Yes when stronger qualifying evidence becomes available and the record meets the Gold
policy.
Can Blue become Green or Gold?
Yes. Blue is an evidence state, not a dead end. A later authority confirmation or
stronger match can promote the business into a qualifying verified level.
Can Gold or Green become Blue?
Yes if later checks no longer support the previous qualifying level but still leave
useful registry evidence.
Can a level return to None?
Yes. If the evidence is no longer valid, the authority match fails, the record is
corrected to a different entity, or policy no longer treats the evidence as qualifying,
the level can return to None.
What is countsAsVerified?
The machine-readable countsAsVerified field is true only when the business is in a
qualifying verified state under policy. In the current model, Gold and Green can count
as verified; Blue and None do not.
Why keep countsAsVerified if the color already exists?
Machine clients should not have to guess policy from a color label. The explicit boolean
makes the public meaning unambiguous and allows policy to evolve without forcing every
client to hard-code color logic.
What is the public badge label for Gold?
Gold is presented as Full Registry Verified.
What is the public badge label for Green?
Green is presented as Registry Verified.
What is the public badge label for Blue?
Blue is presented as Registry Evidence.
What is shown for a business with no registry level?
The Directory can omit a verification badge or describe the business as not registry
verified, depending on the surface. It should not display a negative fraud implication.
Why not show a red badge for unverified businesses?
Absence of qualifying registry verification is not proof of wrongdoing. A neutral state
avoids turning incomplete coverage, pending checks or newly discovered records into an
accusation.
Are Gold, Green and Blue consumer ratings?
No. They describe registry-verification evidence, not customer satisfaction, product
quality or reputation.
Are the colors tied to payment tiers?
No. The verification colors should reflect evidence policy, not subscription level.
Does a Gold business automatically become featured?
Not necessarily. Featured ranking can consider registry verification together with
Directory Score, freshness, public visibility and other supported ranking signals.
Does registry verification affect search filters?
Yes. The Directory can provide a Registry verified filter that returns businesses whose
verification state qualifies under the Gold or Green policy.
How should a registry verified filter treat Blue?
Blue should not be included in a filter that promises registry verified businesses. Blue
can be exposed through its own evidence label or future evidence-specific filters.
How are verification numbers calculated in public analytics?
Verified business totals count qualifying Gold and Green records. Gold, Green and Blue
are also reported separately so the public can see the composition rather than only one
headline number.
Owner and claim verification
Is Business Registry Verification the same as claiming a listing?
No. Registry verification concerns the business entity. Claiming concerns who can
control the Directory profile.
Can the owner claim a business that is already Gold?
Yes. Registry verification does not create an owner account. An authorized owner can
still claim or activate access to manage the profile.
Can the owner claim a Blue business?
Yes, subject to the normal claim workflow. Blue only describes registry evidence and
does not replace owner-control checks.
Can the owner claim a business with no registry verification?
Yes. Owner claiming and Business Registry Verification are independent paths.
What are the older ownership verification states?
The owner or profile-control layer can use states such as unverified, email verified,
domain verified or gateway verified. These states should not be presented as the
business-registry badge.
Why keep the old ownership verification structure?
It already represents useful profile-control semantics. Reusing it for legal-business
verification would mix two different trust questions and make filters, analytics and
owner flows ambiguous.
Does registry verification automatically give someone access to the Owner dashboard?
No. A business can be registry verified with no owner account at all. Owner access
requires the separate activation or claim process.
Does owner login prove registry verification?
No. Authentication proves access to an account, not that the business has passed the
registry-verification policy.
Can the owner see registry verification in the dashboard?
The owner experience can display the public business-verification state as a separate
profile signal. It should remain distinct from account security and owner-control
verification.
Can owner corrections affect registry verification?
A correction can change the public business data used for future matching. If the
corrected identity changes the registry match, the verifier can re-evaluate the
business.
Can an owner force Gold or Green from the dashboard?
No. The public registry level should follow supported evidence and verification policy,
not a manual preference setting.
What happens after a business becomes registry verified?
The record can immediately expose the qualifying public verification state. Separately,
the acquisition and owner-access systems may use qualifying verification as a signal for
appropriate outreach or onboarding.
Can ASG invite an owner before the owner claims the profile?
Qualifying verified businesses can be eligible for a proactive invitation workflow when
ASG has an appropriate public business contact path. That invitation does not pretend
the recipient has already proven ownership.
Does Blue trigger automatic owner invitation?
No. Registry Evidence is intentionally non-qualifying for automatic verified-business
invitation policy. Stronger qualifying verification is required.
Do Gold and Green make a business eligible for proactive invitation?
They can be used as qualifying signals because they count as verified under current
policy. Other safety, contact and suppression rules can still apply before any outreach
is sent.
Does a proactive invitation create a fake claim?
No. A proactive owner invitation must remain separate from the claim-bound invitation
path. The system should not fabricate a claim merely to reuse claim workflow tables.
Where do the claim path and proactive path finally meet?
They can converge only after legitimate activation at the shared Owner account and
access layer. Before activation, the two invitation paths remain separate so their
meaning stays honest.
Does proactive invitation mean the recipient is legally verified as owner?
No. The invitation is an opportunity to activate access for a registry-verified
business. It must not state that the recipient has already completed legal-owner
identity verification.
Entity classification
How does entity classification relate to verification?
Before applying business policy, the Directory can classify a record as business,
government, nonprofit, education, healthcare, association or unknown. This prevents
business-only verification rules from being applied blindly to every organization.
Are government entities Business Registry Verified?
No. Government departments, agencies and public authorities use a separate
entity-classification model. Business Registry Verification is not applicable to them.
Why is government not treated as an unverified business?
Because a government body is not simply a business that failed verification. It belongs
to a different entity category and should not receive a misleading business-registry
badge.
Can a government website still be important to Business Verification?
Yes. Government or public-authority websites can be authoritative evidence sources used
to verify businesses, even though the government entity itself is not treated as a
business.
What happens to a government record in the public API?
The Directory can expose entityType as government and return business verification as
not applicable. This preserves clarity for human and machine clients.
What is a state-owned enterprise?
A commercial company owned or controlled by a state can still be classified as a
business when it operates as a commercial enterprise. It should not automatically be
classified as a government department.
Why does state ownership not automatically mean government entity?
Entity classification describes what the organization is and how it operates, not only
who owns it. A state-owned commercial enterprise can remain a business while a ministry
or regulator remains government.
What happens when government evidence is uncertain?
The classifier can keep the entity unknown or flag it for review rather than forcing a
government label from weak evidence.
Can entity classification change later?
Yes. As stronger evidence arrives, a record can be reclassified. Verification policy
should then follow the new entity type.
Does the Business Verifier classify entities?
The preferred architecture keeps entity classification upstream in the Directory
indexing layer. The verifier consumes that classification instead of inventing a
competing entity model.
Why keep classification in the Indexer?
The Indexer already has the structured evidence needed to normalize the business record.
Classifying there avoids extra database reads and prevents multiple workers from
assigning conflicting entity types.
Can nonprofit, education or healthcare entities be verified?
These entity types can require authority-specific policy. The Directory can expose their
classification now while verification coverage evolves. The system should avoid
pretending every non-government organization follows the exact same commercial registry
path.
What does unknown entity type mean?
Unknown means the Directory does not yet have enough confidence to assign a stronger
entity category. It is a deliberate uncertainty state, not an error or negative
judgment.
Evidence, data and refresh
How does the verifier match a Directory record to registry evidence?
The matching process can compare normalized business names, legal names, jurisdiction,
registry identifiers and other supported evidence. The exact matching rules can vary by
authority adapter.
Why normalize names before matching?
Public websites and registries can format the same legal name differently. Normalization
helps compare equivalent forms while still preserving the original public and legal
names for display.
Can a trading name differ from the legal name?
Yes. The Directory can keep a public brand or trading name while separately exposing a
registry legal name when supported evidence provides it.
Does the verifier trust any page that mentions a company name?
No. Evidence strength matters. An authoritative registry record is not equivalent to an
unrelated webpage containing the same name.
How are authority results stored?
The verification system can store public-safe summary fields on the Directory listing
and maintain internal check records or state needed for retries, auditing and scheduled
rechecks.
Why store verification fields on directory_listings?
The public Directory needs fast access to the current verification state for cards,
filters, quick view and analytics. Storing the current snapshot on the listing avoids
rebuilding the entire verification history for every page view.
Does the Directory keep every raw authority response publicly?
No. Public responses should expose only the fields appropriate for public business
discovery. Raw credentials, internal diagnostics and non-public authority response
details do not belong in public profile JSON.
How frequently can verification refresh?
Refresh timing can depend on authority limits, previous result, next-check scheduling
and system policy. A record can carry checkedAt and nextCheckAt so the refresh lifecycle
remains explicit.
What if the business changes legal name?
A later authority check can discover the changed legal name. The Directory can update
the legal-name evidence while preserving public display-name policy and change history
where appropriate.
What if a company becomes inactive or dissolved?
A supported registry status change can cause the verification state to be re-evaluated.
A business should not keep an outdated qualifying badge forever when the underlying
authority evidence has materially changed.
Does a registry status of inactive always remove the public listing?
Not necessarily. Registry status and Directory publication are separate concepts. The
Directory can retain a public historical or informational record while adjusting
verification, freshness or visibility policy as appropriate.
Can the verifier retry failed authority requests?
Yes. Temporary network, rate-limit or authority failures can be retried according to
configured scheduling and backoff policy rather than being treated as final business
evidence.
How does the system avoid repeatedly checking everything at once?
The verifier can use queues, cursors, incremental snapshots and next-check timestamps so
large public datasets are processed in controlled batches instead of re-querying the
entire population continuously.
Does the verifier need the crawler to verify every business?
Not necessarily. The crawler can supply discovery evidence, but registry verification
can use the canonical Directory listing and configured authority integrations directly.
Can website evidence support registry verification?
Website evidence can support identity correlation, but it should not silently replace
the authority layer when policy requires registry confirmation.
What if a registry uses historical trading names?
Historical names can be useful evidence but should be interpreted according to the
authority's semantics. A historical trading name should not automatically be treated as
the current legal business name.
How are false positives reduced?
The verifier can require jurisdiction consistency, strong name or identifier matching,
appropriate authority evidence and policy thresholds before assigning a qualifying
level.
How are false negatives handled?
A missing direct match can remain pending, evidence-only or unverified rather than
becoming a fraud label. Coverage gaps and authority limitations are expected in a global
directory.
What happens when two companies have the same name?
The verifier should use jurisdiction, registry identifiers and other supported evidence
to distinguish them. Name equality alone should not be enough for a high-confidence
legal-entity match.
Can registry verification work without a website?
Yes when the Directory has enough business identity information and the relevant
authority supports a reliable match. A website is useful for discovery but is not the
legal registry itself.
Can a website-only business remain in the Directory?
Yes. Public discovery can include a website-based business record even while registry
verification is pending or unavailable. The verification state should explain the
evidence gap rather than hiding the business.
Does the verifier use private customer data?
The public business-verification layer is designed around business identity and
supported authority evidence. It should not require private customer conversations or
unrelated personal data to assign a public registry level.
API and machine-readable verification
Where is registry verification exposed in the public business JSON?
The business profile JSON can expose a businessVerification object containing the
public-safe verification status, level, label, authority, registry ID, match score and
related timestamps when available.
What does businessVerification.status mean?
Status describes the current verification workflow result, such as verified, pending or
another supported state. Clients should also read level and countsAsVerified rather than
guessing verification meaning from status alone.
What does businessVerification.level mean?
Level is the normalized public verification tier such as gold, green, blue or none.
What does businessVerification.label mean?
Label is the human-readable presentation such as Full Registry Verified, Registry
Verified, Registry Evidence or Not Registry Verified.
What does businessVerification.authority mean?
Authority identifies the public-safe registry or verification authority associated with
the current evidence when that information is available.
What does businessVerification.registryId mean?
registryId exposes the public-safe business identifier associated with the current
registry evidence when available.
What does businessVerification.matchScore mean?
matchScore is the numeric strength of the registry match under the verification logic.
It should not be treated as a customer-review score.
What does businessVerification.countsAsVerified mean?
It is the explicit machine-readable policy result. Clients can use it to determine
whether the business belongs in the Registry verified set without hard-coding display
labels.
What happens for government entities in businessVerification?
The object can return applicable false, status not_applicable and countsAsVerified
false, making it clear that the business-verification model is intentionally not being
applied.
Can developers filter for registry-verified businesses?
Yes. The public Directory search can support a business_verified=true style filter that
returns businesses whose Gold or Green state qualifies under the current
verified-business policy.
Does the registry filter use old owner verification?
No. The Registry verified filter uses the business-verification fields, not the legacy
owner or claim verification_status field.
Can developers sort by registry verification?
The Directory can expose registry-verification-aware sorting that places qualifying Gold
and Green states ahead of Blue and None while still using supported quality and name
tie-breakers.
Is the legacy verificationStatus still available?
The Directory can retain the legacy verificationStatus for ownership or profile-control
semantics where needed, but public business registry presentation should use
businessVerification.
Why not rename the old verificationStatus?
Renaming an established ownership field would risk breaking claim, owner and existing
API behavior. Adding a separate businessVerification object preserves compatibility and
keeps semantics honest.
Can AI agents understand the difference?
Yes. Separate machine-readable fields let agents distinguish legal-business registry
evidence from profile-control verification, Directory Score, Website Audit and agentic
readiness.
Can the Directory discovery manifest describe registry verification?
Yes. The machine-readable discovery document can explain supported business-verification
levels and clearly state that Business Registry Verification is separate from ownership
verification.
Should llms.txt describe the verifier?
A concise public explanation can help AI systems interpret the Directory correctly,
especially the difference between Gold or Green registry verification and owner claim
status.
Can verification be used in structured data?
Public structured data can reference registry identity or supporting identifiers where
appropriate, but it should avoid inventing schema semantics that imply endorsements or
legal certifications not actually provided by the authority.
Does the API expose raw verifier secrets?
No. Public API responses must never expose API keys, authority credentials, internal
secrets or private service-binding information.
Can public APIs expose verification timestamps?
Yes. checkedAt, verifiedAt and nextCheckAt can be useful public-safe freshness
indicators when present.
Verification analytics
How does the Directory count registry-verified businesses?
The public verified-business total is the number of qualifying Gold and Green records
whose machine policy says they count as verified.
Does Blue contribute to the verified total?
No. Blue is reported separately as Registry Evidence.
What is the eligible-business denominator?
The denominator represents public records to which the current business-registry
verification policy applies. Government entities are excluded because their verification
state is not applicable.
What is the registry verified rate?
It is the qualifying Gold plus Green business count divided by the eligible
public-business population for the current analytics snapshot.
Why show Gold, Green and Blue separately in analytics?
A single verified percentage can hide the strength and maturity of the evidence base.
Showing the level mix lets visitors see full verification, qualifying verification and
evidence-only coverage separately.
Why is the verifier shown in the Metrics drawer?
Registry verification is now a first-class trust dimension of the Directory, so the
Metrics drawer can show the live verified-business total and eligible rate alongside
public listings, countries and other network measures.
Why is registry verification shown in the Analytics drawer?
The Analytics drawer summarizes public business-graph health. Registry verification
belongs there because it measures trust coverage rather than merely UI activity.
Why is verification shown in the detailed analytics section?
The detailed analytics section can show Gold, Green, Blue and not-verified populations
so users can inspect the composition behind the headline verified rate.
Does verification analytics require a separate verifier API call?
No. The Directory analytics response can expose the current registryVerification
aggregate from Directory listing data, allowing multiple frontend surfaces to reuse one
analytics snapshot.
Does every frontend verification panel query D1 separately?
No. The intended design is to reuse the same analytics.registryVerification object
across the Metrics drawer, Analytics drawer, trust strip, ticker and detailed analytics
card.
Why is that reuse important?
It keeps public numbers consistent and avoids multiplying database reads simply because
the same metric is displayed in several places.
Can analytics disagree with the Registry verified search filter?
They should use the same qualifying policy. If they disagree, the system should treat it
as an implementation or caching issue and fix the exposure path rather than inventing a
second definition of verified.
What should a verified-business count include?
It should include only records that meet the current qualifying Business Registry
Verification policy and are part of the relevant public Directory population.
Should owner-claimed businesses be added to the registry-verified count?
No. Claim status is a separate metric. A claimed business only belongs in the
registry-verified count if its businessVerification state independently qualifies.
Can registry verification be used in Directory momentum or health indicators?
Yes, as long as the component is clearly labeled and uses the business-registry verified
rate rather than the old hidden ownership-verification rate.
Why remove old generic verified metrics from some public surfaces?
The old metric represented owner or profile-control verification and could be mistaken
for legal-business verification. Public surfaces should prefer the new explicit
registry-verification meaning where they discuss business trust.
Trust, privacy and policy
Does registry verification expose private owner information?
No. Business Registry Verification can operate before an owner account exists and should
expose public business evidence, not private owner-account data.
Does the verifier expose email addresses used for internal outreach?
Not as part of the public verification badge. Public contact information follows the
Directory's separate public-contact policy.
Does the verifier track website visitors?
No. Business Registry Verification concerns business identity evidence. Visitor
analytics and public activity are separate systems.
Does registry verification mean ASG guarantees the business?
No. ASG is presenting a verification signal derived from supported evidence. Users
remain responsible for their own due diligence and transaction decisions.
Can a verified business still have outdated profile content?
Yes. Registry identity confidence does not freeze every public field. Website, service,
product, location and contact information can still change.
Can a registry-verified business still receive a low Website Audit score?
Yes. Website Audit evaluates the current public website and machine-readiness signals.
Registry Verification evaluates business identity evidence. They are intentionally
independent.
Can a registry-verified business have no active agent?
Yes. Agentic readiness and live AIG capability are separate from legal-business registry
verification.
Can an active agent belong to an unverified business?
Potentially, because agent capability and registry verification are different
dimensions. Public interfaces should show both states rather than implying one proves
the other.
Can a paid profile be unverified?
Payment or subscription status should not automatically qualify a business for registry
verification.
Can a registry-verified business be removed from public search?
Yes when publication, suppression, removal or policy rules require it. Verification does
not override the Directory's visibility and safety controls.
How does the Directory communicate uncertainty?
It uses explicit states such as pending, Blue Registry Evidence, None or unknown entity
classification rather than converting every uncertain case into a binary verified or
fake judgment.
Why is uncertainty important in a global registry system?
Countries publish different data, authorities have different APIs, businesses use
different legal forms and coverage is uneven. A trustworthy system must represent those
gaps rather than hide them.
Does ASG manually approve every verified business?
The system is designed for automated authority-backed verification at scale, with review
paths for ambiguous or exceptional cases. Automation should still follow the same
evidence policy.
Can an internal administrator override verification?
Administrative repair or review tools may exist, but public verification should remain
auditable and evidence-based. Manual actions should not silently erase the distinction
between evidence and policy.
Why does the Directory publish verification methodology in the FAQ?
The verification badge affects trust. Explaining what it means, what it does not mean
and how it differs from owner claiming helps people and machines interpret it correctly.
Corrections and review
What should I do if my business is matched to the wrong registry record?
Use the supported correction or review process and provide the most useful public
identifying information available. The Directory can re-evaluate the registry match
rather than keeping an incorrect badge.
What should I do if my legal name is wrong?
Submit a correction through the Directory workflow. A future verification pass can
compare the corrected business identity with the supporting authority evidence.
What should I do if my registry ID is wrong?
Request a correction or review. Registry identifiers are important evidence and should
not be changed casually without support.
What if my business is real but still shows Not Registry Verified?
The record may be awaiting authority processing, missing a strong match, located in a
jurisdiction with limited coverage or using identifiers the current adapter cannot
confirm. Not Registry Verified is not a fraud label.
What if my business shows Blue?
Blue means the system found meaningful registry evidence but has not reached a
qualifying Gold or Green state. A later authority check can improve the result if
stronger evidence becomes available.
What if my business should be Gold but shows Green?
The current authority path may support a qualifying match without the stronger evidence
required for Gold. A recheck can update the level when stronger evidence becomes
available.
What if a government body is shown as a business?
That is primarily an entity-classification problem. The Directory should correct the
entity type so business verification becomes not applicable rather than merely changing
the badge color.
What if a commercial state-owned company is shown as government?
The classification should be reviewed. A commercial state-owned enterprise can remain a
business if its operating form and evidence support that classification.
What if a verified business closes?
A later registry check or public-data refresh can update the registry status and
verification state. Directory visibility can then follow publication and review policy.
What if an authority API changes?
The relevant adapter can be updated while preserving the public verification model.
Businesses should not be assigned new meaning merely because an upstream API changed its
response format.
What if verification analytics suddenly show zero?
The first checks should compare the Registry verified search filter with the public
analytics registryVerification object. If the filter returns businesses but analytics
show zero, the issue is likely in aggregation exposure, response assembly or caching
rather than the verifier data itself.
How can developers confirm the live verified count?
Compare the public Directory query using the registry-verified filter with the analytics
registryVerification.verifiedBusinesses total. Both should reflect the same qualifying
Gold and Green policy.
Can cached analytics temporarily lag behind new verification results?
Yes. Public API caching can briefly delay aggregate visibility even when individual
listing filters already see the updated verification fields. Cache policy should keep
that delay bounded and predictable.
Should the frontend calculate verification totals from the first page of search results?
No. That would produce false totals because search results are paginated. Verification
totals belong in the server-side analytics response or another authoritative aggregate
endpoint.
Should every public page re-scan the entire Directory to calculate verifier totals?
No. The Directory should reuse existing analytics work and cached aggregates where
appropriate. Displaying the same number in multiple UI surfaces is not a reason to
repeat the same database scan.
How do I know the verifier layer is working?
A healthy system shows qualifying businesses through the Registry verified filter,
exposes businessVerification on individual business JSON, and reports matching Gold and
Green totals through public analytics.
System map
What is the complete ASG trust model in one view?
Discovery identifies the public business record. Entity classification determines
whether business-registry verification is applicable. Business Registry Verification
evaluates supported authority evidence and assigns Gold, Green, Blue or None.
Gold and Green count as registry verified; Blue is evidence only. Owner claim and
profile-control verification remain separate. Directory Score measures record strength,
Website Audit measures current website readiness, and agentic status describes machine
capability. Public analytics reuse the same registry-verification policy so search,
filters, business cards, quick view, metrics and analytics all describe the same truth.
Business Registry Verification is an evidence signal, not an endorsement, credit rating,
legal opinion, product guarantee or substitute for sector-specific licensing checks.