Formal is a protocol-aware reverse proxy that secures access to databases, APIs, infrastructure, and AI tools by enforcing least privilege at the wire-protocol level. Deployed as a single stateless binary in a VPC through Terraform, Kubernetes, or Docker, it sits between identities and resources without application changes, SDKs, or agents. Formal parses more than 15 protocols, including PostgreSQL, MySQL, MongoDB, Snowflake, SSH, Kubernetes, HTTP, MCP, S3, Redis, RDP, BigQuery, ClickHouse, and DynamoDB, allowing query-level decisions instead of generic network filtering. Policies can authenticate and authorize users, mask or filter fields, rewrite requests, block actions, require MFA, quarantine sessions, suspend access, or support impersonation across session, request, and response stages. Teams can secure AI agents and MCP servers by stripping PII before it reaches a model, blocking unauthorized tool calls, and auditing every action.