The car can see it. It can't pick it up.
A car with no driver has no one to notice the phone, wipe the seat or hand anything back. It does have a camera, a mandate and a hub nearby.
- Who asks
- The car itself, under the fleet's mandate: clean the seat, take the phone into custody. Then the fleet's rider-support agent books the return.
- Who does it
- Staff at the fleet's service hub clean, bag and seal. A courier from the marketplace carries the bag. The rider confirms they got it.
- Evidence only
- The cabin camera, the smart locker's door log and the seal tag. They don't do the work; they prove each step of it.
- Who pays
- Clean $6, custody $3, courier $14. Charged to the rider or absorbed by the fleet, under its own policy. Example figures.
- Privacy
- The phone is never unlocked. The proof says “personal item”, not what's on it, and the rider's face is never in it.
- You get
- One proof: found, cleaned, bagged, stored, delivered, confirmed. Every handoff signed by whoever had it.
Six hands touch the phone on its way home. Every one of them signs for it.
The car asks first, the fleet's agent asks next, and people do the work. The camera, the locker and the seal only prove it.
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Lumen Rides, car AV-118 and hub 3 are fictional. Prices are illustrative.
No gap in the chain, or no proof.
Custody is a chain of handoffs. Each one is signed by whoever is taking the phone: a camera, a badge, a locker, a courier's scan, the rider. One missing signature and the chain fails.
A failed chain doesn't mean the phone is lost. It means nobody can prove where it was, so the return is held and a person looks into it.
From the back seat to the rider, in six steps.
Three tasks in one workflow: clean the seat, take the phone into custody, get it home. Two different requesters, one fleet answering for both.
- 01
Find
After the ride, the cabin camera scans an empty cabin: a phone on the back seat and a coffee spill. The car takes itself out of service.
- 02
Clean
At hub 3, staff clean the seat. The cabin camera's after-scan is the evidence. On accept, the car goes back into service.
- 03
Bag and seal
Staff bag the phone, seal it and scan the bag's tag with their badge. Custody passes from the car to a person.
- 04
Store
The bag goes into locker L-12. The locker logs the door, and custody passes to the locker.
- 05
Courier
The rider-support agent books a courier. They scan the bag out of the locker and carry it to the rider.
- 06
Rider confirms
The rider confirms in the app that it's theirs and the seal is intact. That confirmation is the last piece of evidence.
Five rules about custody, one look at the seat.
Whether the custody held is all rules: signatures, order, the seal. Only “is the seat clean?” needs a model, and a versioned policy, not the model, makes the decision.
| Check | How | Evidence from | By | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Seat clean | The cabin camera's after-scan: nothing left behind, nothing spilled. | Cabin camera | Model | Passed |
| Every handoff signed | Car, staff badge, seal tag, locker log, courier scan, rider. A missing signature fails the chain. | Each custodian | Rule | Passed |
| In order | Found, then bagged, then stored, then carried, then delivered. No step out of sequence. | Custody log | Rule | Passed |
| Seal intact | The same tag number, unbroken, at every scan, and at the rider's door. | Seal tag | Rule | Passed |
| The right rider | Confirmed in the app by the account that took the ride, not a doorstep photo. | Rider | Rule | Passed |
| In good time | Back with the rider within the fleet's promise, by trusted time. | Custody log | Rule | Passed |
The car goes back into service when the clean-up is accepted. The phone's return is its own task, so a slow courier never keeps a car off the road.
§ 05 · Cabin privacy
The camera sees the seat. Nobody sees the phone.
A cabin camera that looks for left-behind things is also looking at people's belongings. It scans only an empty cabin, after the ride. Only a crop of the item leaves the car, and the phone itself stays locked from the seat to the rider's hand.
- Cabin scan
- After the ride, cabin confirmed empty
- Shared
- A crop of the item. Nothing else.
- The item
- “Personal item”. Never opened or unlocked.
- Special items
- Wallets, medication: staff-only custody
- Couriers
- Higher trust tier, sealed bag only
- Budget
- Up to $25 per item, shown to the rider
The car posts under this mandate. Its hash goes into the proof.
What needs care.
A stranger's phone, a camera in a private space, and four pairs of hands in between. Each needs a rule.
The camera sees the seat, not the rider
The cabin scan runs only after the ride, with the cabin confirmed empty. The requester sees a crop of the item, and nothing else from the camera.
Never unlocked
Nobody opens, unlocks or charges the phone to find its owner. The ride already says whose it is. The proof records “personal item”.
Some items have rules
Wallets, medication and cash can come with legal handling rules. They go to staff-only custody under the fleet's policy, never straight to a marketplace courier.
A gap fails the chain
If anyone along the way didn't sign for it, the chain fails and the return is held for review. A quiet hand-delivery doesn't count.
Couriers who can be trusted with it
Returns go to couriers on a higher trust tier, carrying a sealed bag they can't open without it showing.
Who pays is said up front
Whether the rider pays the courier or the fleet absorbs it is the fleet's policy, shown to the rider before the return is booked.
Found, cleaned, bagged, stored, delivered, confirmed.
One receipt for the whole return. It names each custodian by role, shows the seal held, and never says what was on the phone.
Dollars pay the hub staff and the courier. Nobody needs $PORT to post a lost item or to carry one home.
- Task
- Lost item return · ride 7F2
- Requested by
- Car AV-118, then rider-support agent
- Performed by
- Hub staff · courier
- Evidence
- Cabin camera, locker log, seal tag
- Custody
- 6 handoffs · seal intact
- Item
- Personal item · not opened
- Received
- Confirmed by the rider in app
- Decision
- Accepted
- Paid
- $23.00 · clean, custody, courier
STATUS: FINAL
The phone's contents: never seen. The proof says “personal item”.
For builders.
An AUTONOMOUS_VEHICLE requester and a SENSOR_EVENT trigger. CLEAN, PICK and DELIVER tasks in one workflow. v0.2 can get close with SEQUENCE, but custody needs its own condition.
PhysicalTaskSpec · custody taskTAP v0.2 + proposed CUSTODY · preview, subject to change
{
"schema": "teleport.tap.physical-task",
"version": "0.2.0",
"title": "Take personal item into custody — AV-118, hub 3",
"category": "PICK",
"requester": {
"requesterType": "AUTONOMOUS_VEHICLE",
"principal": { "principalType": "ORGANIZATION" },
"mandateId": "mdt_lumen_cabin_service_v2"
},
"trigger": {
"type": "SENSOR_EVENT",
"sourceRef": "av118:cabin_scan:post_ride",
"occurredAt": "2026-11-01T22:41:07Z"
},
"fulfillment": {
"mode": "DIRECT",
"designatedPerformers": [{ "fleetId": "hub3_staff", "actorType": "HUMAN" }]
},
"relations": { "workflowId": "wf_av118_ride_7f2_lost_item" },
"completionConditions": [
{ "type": "SEQUENCE", "id": "custody_order",
"steps": ["FOUND", "BAGGED", "SEALED", "STORED"], "verificationMethod": "DETERMINISTIC" },
{ "type": "STATE", "id": "seal_intact", "subjectRef": "seal_tag:0417",
"property": "intact", "expected": true, "verificationMethod": "DETERMINISTIC" },
{ "type": "CUSTODY", "id": "no_gaps", "objectRef": "commit:item_7f2",
"requireSignedHandoffs": true, "verificationMethod": "DETERMINISTIC" }
],
"rightsPolicy": { "policyId": "item-crop-only-v1" },
"economics": {
"performerPayUsdCents": 300,
"settlementAssets": ["FIAT"],
"requesterPayment": { "method": "MANDATE_BUDGET", "maxSpendUsdCents": 2500 }
},
"popw": { "required": true, "assurancePolicyId": "VERIFIED", "proofTiming": "WORKFLOW" },
"metadata": { "itemClass": "PERSONAL_ITEM", "unlockAllowed": false }
}Proposed additions this use case surfaced
- Custody chains
- A first-class custody record: the object (as a commitment), then each custodian in order, each with a signed handoff (badge, device key, scan) and the seal's state. A CUSTODY condition that fails on any gap.
- Receiver confirmation
- The person receiving the item confirms in their own app, signed by their account, and that counts as evidence, not just a courtesy.
- Handoff between requesters
- The car asks for the clean-up and the custody; the fleet's agent asks for the return. One workflow, two requesters, one accountable fleet.
- Item-only evidence
- A rights rule that only the crop of the item leaves the car. The rest of the cabin frame stays with the fleet, for disputes only.
- Back in service on accept
- An outcome event to the fleet when the clean-up is accepted, so the car's return to service waits on the proof, not on a person ticking a box.
Example economics: $6 for the clean, $3 for custody, $14 to the courier, each paid on accept. Who covers it, rider or fleet, is the fleet's policy. Developer docs
Autonomous vehicle fleets
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