Security

What Is Egress Filtering?

Network-level control that restricts which external domains an AI agent can communicate with, preventing data exfiltration.

In Plain English

Egress filtering is a firewall for your AI agent. It controls outbound network traffic — which external services the agent can reach. Without it, a compromised agent could send your data to any server on the internet.

With egress filtering, you define an allowlist of approved domains. The agent can reach api.anthropic.com (for LLM calls), api.stripe.com (for payment lookups), and nothing else. Any attempt to reach an unapproved domain is blocked and logged.

Why It Matters for OpenClaw

Egress filtering prevents the worst-case scenario: data exfiltration. Even if an agent is compromised via prompt injection, it cannot send your data to an external server because the network blocks it.

How Clawctl Helps

Clawctl enforces domain-level egress filtering per agent. Default allowlist includes your LLM provider. Add domains as needed. Every blocked request is logged in the audit trail.

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Common Questions

What domains are allowed by default?

Your configured LLM provider (api.anthropic.com, api.openai.com, etc.) and any MCP server domains you connect.

What happens when the agent tries to reach a blocked domain?

The request is blocked and logged. The agent receives an error and cannot access the domain.

Can I add custom domains?

Yes. Add any domain to the allowlist through the Clawctl dashboard or CLI.