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Agent discovery: find every agent and MCP in your estate
Most teams can list their users and IAM identities, but not every AI agent or MCP server acting in their environment. Start with an inventory that discovers agents and MCP connections, maps each agent to its tools and calling identity, and records tool calls. Then put the traffic through a gateway so unsafe calls, spend, and evidence can be governed.
Agent discovery is the prerequisite for agent policy. IAM identifies people and services; it does not by itself identify every agent, MCP server, tool call, or downstream spend path. Pair discovery with the outbound Gateway hook: agents have IAM; spend/tool calls don't. UnitOne Gateway gives teams that control path. Start free.
Agent discovery before agent policy
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The blind spot: an estate can have agents nobody cataloged
Agents can be embedded in apps, developer workflows, internal automations, and vendor products. MCP servers add another inventory surface: tools, data access, and dependencies. If you cannot name the agent, owner, tools, and calls, you cannot govern the path.
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What an agent discovery inventory must answer
Which agents and MCP servers exist? Who owns them, where do they run, and which model or provider do they use? Which tools, data sources, identities, and environments can they reach? Keep those relationships — a list of application names is not an inventory you can govern.
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Discovery signals and a practical inventory workflow
Combine deployment and configuration records, network and gateway telemetry, tool registrations, and IAM context. Normalize agent, MCP server, tool, owner, environment, and call relationships. Mark unknown or unmanaged assets for review rather than pretending the inventory is complete.
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From inventory to control: identity, tool calls, and spend
IAM answers who is authorized. Call-level visibility answers what the agent did. Attribute calls and spend to agent and team, apply tool controls, and retain useful evidence. Use Gateway as the enforcement and observability layer. Discovery alone does not block activity.
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A lightweight first pass for platform and security teams
Start with the highest-volume agents and MCP servers. Assign owners and risk tiers, review reachable tools, and set a recurring inventory check. Start free with UnitOne Gateway, then expand coverage as the estate becomes legible.
Frequently asked questions
- What is AI agent discovery?
- AI agent discovery is the process of finding and cataloging the agents operating in an environment, including their owners, runtime locations, models, identities, tools, MCP connections, and activity. The goal is a usable inventory rather than a one-time list of application names.
- How do I discover MCP servers in my organization?
- Start by collecting MCP server registrations and configurations, then validate them against deployment records, network or gateway telemetry, tool definitions, owners, and IAM context. Record the tools and data each server can expose, and flag servers that have no clear owner or approved path.
- Why is IAM not enough for agent governance?
- IAM can identify the human or service identity behind a request, but it may not show which agent initiated the action, which MCP tool was called, what downstream service was reached, or how much the call cost. Agent governance needs identity plus agent- and call-level visibility.
- What should an agent inventory include?
- At minimum, track agent name and owner, application and environment, model/provider, service identity, MCP servers, available tools, data access, call volume, spend attribution, and last-seen status. Keep the relationships between agents, tools, and calls so the inventory supports actual policy decisions.
- How can I start governing agent tool calls and spend?
- First identify the agents and tools that matter most, then route their traffic through a gateway that can observe calls, apply tool controls, and attribute spend by agent or team. Start free with UnitOne Gateway, or See Gateway for the product path.
Find every agent. Then govern the path.
Start free on Gateway so discovery, tool calls, and spend sit on one inspectable path. See Gateway for how the control plane works. Discovery shows what exists and what can be called; Gateway provides the control and attribution path.