Not so clear. Carpenter does not mention this expression at all. The Patterson reference refers to a lecture, not an accessible document, so nobody can verify it it referred to the "rule of least power", but probably not, as it is only cited in reference to the "principle of least privilege" in security. Only the W3C and the Axioms references are pertinent, and the latter is the primary source. Google search does show that the "rule" has been cited by several bloggers.  The references for this article should, at least, be cleaned up and if possible augmented with references that clearly support notability.    

 == The principle of least privilege == 

 There is a similarity between the concepts, but one can surely find many other examples (Occam's razor, for starters). I cannot see how its mention is useful in this article, and frankly I find the 2nd paragraph (where it is mentioned) confusing.