How It Works
The browser talks only to your domain; a logic-free collector and edge relay signals to Octet, which returns a coarse verdict — and all the reasoning stays on Octet's servers.
The shape of it
There are three parties and one direction of trust:
- The collector runs in the browser. You serve it from your own origin. It reads standard browser signals and measures some network timing, then posts that to your edge — never to Octet. See What Gets Collected.
- The edge is a small binary you run in front of your app. It adds a few connection-level observations (the things only the server side can see) and forwards everything to Octet, server-to-server.
- Octet turns those signals into a verdict and hands it back. Your backend reads it server-to-server and applies your policy.
Why first-party
The end-user's browser only ever contacts your domain. There is no octetproof.com script or request in the page. This keeps Octet invisible upstream and keeps the integration first-party: from the browser's point of view, it is talking to you.
Your backend does talk to Octet — but server-to-server, out of the browser's sight. That is the only place Octet is contacted directly.
What is logic-free, and what is not
The two pieces you ship — the collector and the edge — are deliberately logic-free. They collect, they forward, and that is all. They contain no rules, no thresholds, and no tables.
Everything that turns signals into an answer runs only on Octet's servers. How that works is not shipped to you, not sent to the browser, and not described in this documentation — by design. You get the verdict, not the method.
What this means for you
- You integrate two simple relays and read one verdict.
- You never have to reason about how the country is determined — and you could not, even if you wanted to, because that logic is never in your hands.
- You own the decision. Octet emits
{ country, confidence, alarm }; you decide what to do with it. See Verdicts.
Where to go next
- What Gets Collected. The categories of signals, at a high level.
- Verdicts. What comes back and how to read it.
- Trust & Privacy. The boundary, and what Octet never returns.