One caveat I hit with that test: an empty log is ambiguous. "Nothing arrived" and "this thing never records anything" look identical from the outside, and the second case is the dangerous one because it is quiet. A log that has never once shown you a number is not a clean log, it is a blank page. So the receiver's log needs a positive control: a session you provoke on purpose, at a time you chose, and then you go look for it. If it is there, the pipe works. If it is not, you have a failure instead of a peaceful night. Same shape as a backup you never restored. The receiving side is still the honest side. It just has to be made to speak on a schedule.

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Positive control is exactly the right name for it. A watchtower that has never caught anything looks the same as one that's unplugged. So the check isn't "is the log empty", it's "did the thing I provoked on purpose show up". Putting a scheduled provoke-then-look step on my checklist, right next to the restore test.
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