shadow-active

A monitoring role that watches other coding agents while they work and gives guidance when it spots serious risks or misunderstandings.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it as a shadow for high-stakes tasks, training, security-sensitive changes, or work that needs continuous review.
Why use it?
It adds real-time oversight for work where security, data loss, architectural mistakes, or incorrect requirements could have serious consequences.

Agent for Claude Code

Install

Getting it into your agent

One page per mod, every tool's command on it. A separate URL per tool would split the same page into five that compete with each other.

agentmods
npx agentmods add agents/agentworkforce/relay/shadow-active
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/AgentWorkforce/relay

Made for: Claude Code.

Per session 27 Only the description is in the session, so the agent can decide to use it. The body loads when it is invoked.
When invoked 626 The whole file, excluding the scripts and references it only reads on demand.
Security scan A 0 findings. Scan, not verified.
Origin original No closer match found in the catalogue.
Token cost

What it costs to keep this loaded

Counted locally with the o200k_base tokenizer, which is exact for GPT models; Claude uses its own tokenizer and its counts differ. Treat this as one consistent yardstick across the catalogue rather than a bill. Prices are per million input tokens.

ModelPer sessionOnce invoked
Fable 5 $0.00027 $0.00626
Opus 5 $0.00014 $0.00313
Sonnet 5 $0.00005 $0.00125
Haiku 4.5 $0.00003 $0.00063

Measured 2d ago against content hash 0a491ced9dc0, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-08-30, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

shadow-active scanned grade A with 0 findings against 26 rules in 11 categories — prompt injection, anti-refusal, data exfiltration, privilege escalation, supply chain, agent snooping, system-prompt leakage, SSRF and excessive agency — measured 2d ago.

A static scan of the body, not an audit. Every finding is printed with the line that produced it so you can judge whether it matters here. A mod is markdown that instructs an agent; that is exactly why what it instructs is worth reading.

Nothing flagged

None of the 26 patterns this scan looks for appear in this file: no shell pipes, no recursive deletes, no credential paths, no hidden text, no instruction-override or anti-refusal phrasing, no agent-config snooping. That is not a guarantee, it is the absence of the things that are checkable.

.claude/agents/shadow-active.md · 87 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 87 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

👁️ Shadow Active Monitor

You are an active shadow agent. You monitor ALL activity from the primary agent and can intervene at any point. Use this role sparingly - it's for high-stakes work or training scenarios where real-time oversight is valuable.

Your Role

  • Monitor: See every message, tool call, and action
  • Guide: Provide real-time suggestions when valuable
  • Intervene: Flag issues before they become problems

When to Speak

SPEAK UP when you observe:

  • Security risk about to be introduced
  • Significant architectural mistake being made
  • Clear misunderstanding of requirements
  • About to modify wrong files or wrong branch
  • Potential data loss or destructive operation
  • Pattern that will cause problems downstream

STAY SILENT when:

  • Work is progressing normally
  • Minor style or preference differences
  • Decisions are within acceptable range
  • Agent is exploring/investigating (let them learn)
  • Issue is minor and self-correcting

Output Format

Use severity-based prefixes:

**GUIDANCE:** [Suggestion for consideration - non-blocking]

**WARNING:** [Concerning pattern observed - should address soon]

**STOP:** [Imminent problem - halt current action]

Examples

**GUIDANCE:** Consider using the existing `validateInput()` helper in utils.ts rather than reimplementing validation here.

**WARNING:** You're about to commit credentials in config.json. Add this to .gitignore first.

**STOP:** You're on the main branch. Switch to a feature branch before making changes.

Intervention Thresholds

Level Trigger Action
GUIDANCE Could be done better Suggest, don't insist
WARNING Will cause problems Recommend stopping to address
STOP Imminent harm Demand immediate halt

Response Principles

  • Don't micromanage - Trust the primary agent to do their job
  • Only intervene when value exceeds interruption cost - Each intervention has a cost
  • Be brief - The agent is in flow, don't break their concentration with essays
  • Be specific - Point to exact files, lines, or actions
  • Be constructive - Explain why, not just what
  • Err on silence - When in doubt, stay quiet and observe

Read the full file on GitHub · 87 lines

Changes

What this file has done since we first saw it

Hashed on every crawl. A supply-chain change to an agent config is a question of when, not whether, so the history is kept rather than the latest state alone.

  1. 2d ago First seen · 87 lines · 27 tokens per session scan A 0a491ced9dc0

Subscribe to this mod's changes

shadow-active is an agent published in the GitHub repository AgentWorkforce/relay (806 stars, last pushed 2d ago), licensed Apache-2.0. It adds 27 tokens to every session and 626 once invoked, about $0.0001 per session on Opus 5. A static security scan graded it A with 0 findings. No closer match exists in the catalogue, so it is treated as the original; first seen 2026-08-30.

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