# Near-perfect verifier

A check that is close to right, so the agent cannot solve the wrong problem.

**Is a:** [Guard](/reference/ontology/unattended-agent-failures/guard)

Carlini: "it's important that the task verifier is nearly perfect, otherwise Claude will solve the wrong problem". A known-good compiler served as the oracle, which let 16 agents work at once ([Anthropic, Building a C compiler](https://www.anthropic.com/engineering/building-c-compiler)).

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Published 2026-10-29. Web page: https://www.mackenziebowes.com/reference/ontology/unattended-agent-failures/near-perfect-verifier