Citation Needed: Provenance for LLM-Built Knowledge Graphs — Daniel Chalef, Zep AI
Jul 23, 2026 · 20:54
Daniel Chalef argues that provenance for knowledge graphs built by LLMs must itself be a graph, not a simple source ID, because LLM synthesis destroys the paper trail. In Graphiti, the open-source temporal graph framework behind Zep, sources become episodes and derived facts link back to them, enabling a graph walk to trace any fact. This handles merges (merged entities keep all source links), invalidation (invalid-at dates on mutated edges), and metadata projection (tags on episodes inherit to derived facts). Deletion follows the same edges: a fact survives GDPR erasure only if other supporting episodes remain. Benefits include compliance, veracity evaluation, and debuggability for agentic systems.
