Developers debate the benefits, risks of AI agents

AI agents seem to be the upcoming 2025 buzzword. The autonomous systems are usually defined as software tools designed to automate tasks and achieve complex objectives. Technology experts, however, are already dreaming up new ways that AI agents could be used.

Iris biometrics-based digital identity project World, previously known as Worldcoin, says that its proof-of-human (PoH) concept brings several benefits related to AI agents.

Also known as proof-of personhood, PoH allows us to verify whether a digital action or account belongs to a real human rather than a bot, AI or automated system. World achieves this by confirming a user is real with an iris scan and creating a World ID.

In relation to AI agents, PoH can help distinguish between humans and sophisticated AI agents, such as those that may spread misinformation, according to the firm.

The second benefit is control: AI agents are expected to eventually band together in swarms or networks. Within those conditions, it will be necessary to distinguish who is the human that oversees the agent.

Finally, AI agents may make it more expensive for humans to compete for blockspace on blockchains, which is particularly important for crypto traders. PoH could solve that problem with solutions that give priority to transactions from verified humans over agents or bots. World Chain already implements such a solution.

A digital workforce

Chip-maker Nvidia, on the other hand, sees AI agents in a different light. The company’s Founder and CEO Jensen Huang laid out his vision for the technology in a keynote at CES 2025 last week.

“In the future, these AI agents are essentially digital workforce that are working alongside your employees, doing things for you on your behalf,” says Huang. “The way that you would bring these specialized agents, these special agents, into your company is to onboard them, just like you onboard an employee.”

The company is calling this digital employee pipeline Nemo. Nvidia has created different libraries that help these AI agents be trained according to their client’s needs. One of the big announcements at CES was introducing a family of models based on the Llama Nemotron Models.

“In a lot of ways, the IT department of every company is going to be the HR department of AI agents in the future,” adds Huang. “In the future, they’ll maintain, nurture, onboard and improve a whole bunch of digital agents and provision them to the companies to use.”

How an AI agent causes harm

AI agents are not just closely watched because of their potential to spread misinformation and propaganda. They can cause harm by manipulating the stock market, stealing copyrights, violating privacy and reinforcing biases.

“These are all valid concerns, and any organization that wants to leverage AI needs to take safety and security seriously,” writes computer scientist Chip Huyen in a blog post adapted from her book AI Engineering. “However, this doesn’t mean that AI systems should never be given the ability to act in the real world.”

Huyen adds that companies need to ensure that the system is protected from bad actors who might try to manipulate it into performing harmful actions.

Article Topics

AI agents  |  biometric authentication  |  Nvidia  |  proof of personhood  |  responsible AI  |  World