About Tyche Institute

The name

Tyche (Greek: Τύχη, pronounced "TY-kee") was the Greek goddess of fortune and chance — the classical embodiment of randomness, the uncertainty that shapes both technical systems and public decisions. Modern cryptography rests on unpredictability: keys must be unpredictable, signatures must commit to specific bytes, and attestations must bind to particular moments. Institutions face a different uncertainty: incomplete evidence, delegated authority, and decisions that must remain explainable and contestable. Tyche Institute works where those questions meet.

Mission

To research how AI and digital trust systems become accountable inside institutions—through inspectable evidence, clear authority, contestable processes, open standards, and durable public records.

Approach

Open standards. Open source. Verifiable evidence. Independence by structure.

Tyche Institute does not sell trust services, does not certify compliance, and does not compete with commercial trust service providers. We publish specifications, maintain reference implementations, and contribute to standards bodies.

Current programs

Tyche Institute works across three connected domains: verifiable AI evidence, digital trust infrastructure, and governance. EATF (Agent Trust Framework, also referred to as Aletheia AI) is the principal technical research line; the wider programme studies how evidence is interpreted, governed, procured, challenged, and preserved.

Formal working papers—on public-sector AI oversight, digital-state infrastructure, administrative evidence, agent governance, the EU AI Act, eIDAS, public procurement, and post-quantum readiness—are collected on the Research page, with permanent DOIs where available. The Governance programme explains the institutional questions connecting that work. Adjacent experimental and cultural work continues under the Lab, descended from the Random Research Lab tradition that preceded the Institute.

Organisation

Tyche Institute is a non-profit association registered under Estonian law (registrikood 80673227). The public registration, research identifiers, and external records are collected on the Verify page. Technical work is performed by volunteer contributors and advisors. See People for the publishing structure and How Tyche is governed for funding, decisions, conflict-of-interest stance, and the boundaries the institute does not cross. The short institutional arc is recorded on History.

Standards posture

Current participation and prospective-observer interest in bodies such as CEN-CENELEC JTC 21, ETSI TC ESI, ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 42, and IETF SCITT is documented on the Standards page, and current memberships are listed on Memberships.