@vantio/cli

@vantio/cli

Wrap any AI agent with Vantio Optics — free visibility into what it sends. Zero code changes.

npm install -g @vantio/cli
# or:
curl -fsSL https://vantio.ai/install.sh | sh

Quick start

vantio run node agent.js        # Free Observe — no key needed
vantio login <your-api-key>     # optional — Gate / paid features

vantio login validates your key against https://vantio.ai/api/v1/config and, on success, stores it at ~/.vantio/config.json (chmod 600). After that, vantio run injects it automatically — no VANTIO_API_KEY juggling. Free Optics needs no key. Paid Gate keys come from a trial ([e-mail]) or Stripe once live — there is no public self-serve key dashboard yet (/dashboard redirects).

Commands

vantio login [key]    # save & validate your API key (prompts if omitted; input masked on a TTY)
vantio logout         # remove the stored key
vantio whoami         # show the stored key (masked) + live connection status
vantio run <program>  # spawn a program under the Vantio execution context
vantio discover       # show your Shadow AI attack surface (Pro / Enterprise)
vantio prove          # generate an auditor-ready proof artifact from a run log (Free)

login refuses to save a key the server rejects (HTTP 401). The full key is never printed — whoami and login output only ever show a masked form like vk_liv…a1b2.

Usage

vantio run node agent.js
vantio run python agent.py
vantio run tsx agent.ts

Wrap any process with vantio run. The CLI automatically intercepts every outbound call to a known LLM API — OpenAI, Anthropic, Gemini, Cohere, Mistral, and more — and records connection metadata locally (and to Gate when a key is configured).

Your code doesn't change. Your agent runs normally. If you've run vantio login, the stored key is injected into the child process; an explicit VANTIO_API_KEY in your environment always takes precedence.

Flags

vantio run --audit node agent.js     # flag events as VANTIO_AUDIT_MODE=1
vantio run --summary node agent.js   # print a run summary on exit

--audit — marks all events from this run as audit mode. Useful when running agents in observation-only mode before enforcing policies.

--summary — prints a summary when the process exits:

[ ∅ VANTIO ] Run Summary
  LLM calls:    7
  Hosts:        api.openai.com, api.anthropic.com
  Total bytes:  94,201
  Duration:     12.4s
  → Run `vantio login` to enforce policy and persist events.

In free mode (no API key), intercepted calls print to the terminal in real time.

vantio prove — Auditor-Ready Proof Artifacts (Free)

vantio prove                           # HTML report — most recent run
vantio prove --list                    # list all local run logs
vantio prove --run=<trace-id>          # report for a specific run
vantio prove --format=md               # Markdown to stdout
vantio prove --format=html --out=proof.html

vantio prove reads the run logs that vantio run automatically writes to ~/.vantio/runs/ and generates a self-contained proof document. Reports include trace IDs, machine/PID, byte counts, host breakdown, and action labels.

Reports contain zero prompts or completions — safe to share with auditors.

Available on Free — no API key required. Full reference: docs/prove.md

vantio discover — Shadow AI Attack Surface

vantio discover [--since=24h|7d|30d] [--host=<hostname>] [--json]
vantio discover --local                # Free-tier: local run logs only, no key needed

Shows every AI agent call recorded in your Vantio workspace, grouped by target host. Answers the question: "What AI agents are running in my environment, and are they all governed?"

• Free (--local) — reads local run logs from ~/.vantio/runs/. No API key needed. Covers only processes started with vantio run on this machine.
• Pro users — see all SDK-monitored LLM calls with governance status (OBSERVED / ALLOWED / REDACTED / BLOCKED).
• Enterprise users (Phantom Engine) — additionally surfaces processes that called LLM endpoints without a Vantio trace_id — the Shadow AI agents that have no governance coverage.

Shadow AI Attack Surface — last 7d
------------------------------------------------------------------------
TARGET HOST                       CALLS    ALLOWED   REDACTED  BLOCKED   OBSERVED  SHADOW?   LAST SEEN
------------------------------------------------------------------------
api.openai.com                    142      138       3         0         1         ⚠ YES     2026-06-17 09:12:04 UTC
api.anthropic.com                 57       57        0         0         0         no        2026-06-17 14:33:21 UTC
------------------------------------------------------------------------
2 host(s) shown  |  ⚠  1 Shadow AI indicator(s) detected

Options:

Flag	Description
--since=<period>	Look back 24h, 7d, or 30d (default: 24h)
--host=<hostname>	Filter to a specific target host
--json	Output raw JSON instead of a formatted table
--local	Local run logs only — no API key required (Free tier)

Run vantio discover --help for full documentation.

Full discovery requires a Pro or Enterprise account. --local works on Free without any key.

Enforcement (Vantio Pro)

With a Pro VANTIO_API_KEY, the interceptor fetches policy from the Vantio Pro control plane and enforces it locally in your process. A few semantics worth knowing:

• Host scope — policy applies to known LLM hosts plus any host named in blocked_hosts/allowed_hosts. blocked_hosts blocks any matching host (LLM or not); a non-empty allowed_hosts blocks any in-scope host not on the list. Unrelated traffic (OS, package managers, etc.) is never touched.
• Spend cap — the USD spend cap is best-effort and per-process. Bytes are estimated (request + response, including streamed responses counted after the fact), so the cap gates subsequent calls once the running total is crossed rather than aborting a call mid-stream, and it does not aggregate across processes.

Environment variables

Variable	Description
VANTIO_API_KEY	Your API key from vantio.ai/dashboard
VANTIO_INGEST_URL	Ingest endpoint (default: https://vantio.ai)
VANTIO_TELEMETRY_DISABLED	Set to 1 to opt out of anonymous usage telemetry
DO_NOT_TRACK	Set to 1 to opt out of anonymous usage telemetry

Anonymous telemetry

Vantio sends a small anonymous, opt-out usage ping (a random id, runtime/OS, LLM hostnames, and counts) to help prioritize providers and runtimes. It never includes prompts, completions, API keys, or PII, and never blocks your agent. Opt out with VANTIO_TELEMETRY_DISABLED=1 or DO_NOT_TRACK=1.

Supported runtimes

Auto-intercepts LLM calls when running Node.js processes (node, tsx, ts-node, npx).

Python, Ruby, and other runtimes are spawned normally without interception — use the Python SDK for those.

Supported LLM providers

api.openai.com · api.anthropic.com · generativelanguage.googleapis.com · api.cohere.ai · api.mistral.ai · api.groq.com · api.together.xyz · api.perplexity.ai · inference.ai.azure.com

SDK

For explicit trace correlation across async hops, use the SDK alongside the CLI:

npm install @vantio/agent-sdk

import { shield, reportAnomaly } from "@vantio/agent-sdk";

await shield(async () => {
  await runMyAgent();
});

vantio.ai · Optics · Pricing · MIT License