Perplexity open-sources SPACE, the Firecracker microVM sandbox behind Perplexity Computer
perplexity_ai · x · 2026-10-16
Perplexity has open-sourced SPACE, the sandbox platform that runs every task in Perplexity Computer.
Key design points:
- Each agent task gets its own Firecracker microVM and runs with root inside the sandbox, able to run commands, install packages, and call external services; the host stays outside guest control.
- Credentials and outbound traffic are controlled from outside the VM, with a per-sandbox gateway enforcing egress policy on every outbound connection.
- Built for long-running, stateful, branching agent work: a SPACE sandbox outlives the request that created it and can pause, fork, or suspend to a memory and disk snapshot, then resume where it left off.
Alongside the release, Perplexity published an attack evaluation: nine frontier-model configurations with root inside the VM made 108 escape attempts, and none reached the host.
Related event: Perplexity Open-Sources SPACE, Its Agent Sandbox Platform(7 posts)→
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