Identity sector moves to close trust gap in agentic commerce

As autonomous AI agents begin participating in commerce, the identity industry is increasingly focused on a new challenge: proving who an AI agent represents and what it is authorized to do.

Mastercard aims to lay foundation for agentic transactions

A blog from Mastercard reflects on the progress of Agent Pay, which is designed to bridge the gap in agentic commerce between shopping and payment.

“In controlled, consent‑based scenarios, consumers can now authorise an AI agent to complete a purchase on their behalf, using credentials they already trust,” says the post. “What was once a theoretical discussion about AI‑initiated transactions is now being proven across markets through real‑world pilots, issuer enablement and ecosystem collaboration.” The post lists banks across Europe that have publicly completed controlled, live agentic transactions, using passkeys for authentication.

European investment in agentic payments continues, and acceptance is increasing. Mastercard hopes to ensure that the building blocks, from tokenization and authentication to strong consumer consent, are in place at the foundation. One key building block is Verifiable Intent:
“ensuring that action taken by an AI agent can be traced back to explicit consumer authorization, with clear visibility for issuers and strong governance across the flow.” The concept is designed to ensure that AI-initiated actions remain traceable to an authorized human decision-maker.

Per the blog, Mastercard, Worldline and ING recently performed a live end-to-end fully regionally orchestrated agentic transaction, with all elements of the transaction flow based in Europe. Mastercard says the demonstration shows how collaboration across issuers, acquirers and payment service providers can move agentic commerce from isolated pilots to repeatable models.

“Agentic commerce represents a new chapter in how people interact with digital services,” the payments giant says. “And Europe is helping write it. By combining innovation with accountability, and momentum with discipline, we are laying the groundwork for AI‑driven commerce that can scale responsibly.”

Prove advisory board tackles accountability in agentic commerce

Prove has launched its inaugural Executive Advisory Board, to address the question of who is responsible for a transaction completed by an AI agent. The board recently convened for the first time in New York City, bringing together senior leaders across financial services, payments, commerce, compliance, and AI-native companies.

“Every leap forward in how we transact has created a window – a moment before trust catches up to technology where fraud fills the vacuum. We’re in that window right now.” So says Adi Marom, chief customer officer at Prove. “Prove’s advantage is that we’ve been building the infrastructure to close that window for over a decade, using signals rooted in real human historical digital behavior that AI cannot replicate or fake. This Executive Advisory Board exists to explore how we leverage this unique asset, and how to ensure the industry doesn’t spend the next decade playing catch-up.”

The board includes executives from Tools for Humanity, FanDuel, Visa, Barclays, Citizens Bank, TD, USAA, Binance, Synchrony and more. It will convene formally twice a year under Chatham House Rules, with a mandate to stress-test assumptions, surface emerging threats, and help define trust infrastructure for agentic commerce. Prove will draw insights from the board to inform its long-term innovation strategy and product roadmap.

The shift toward agentic commerce is pushing the identity sector beyond traditional verification toward trust infrastructure capable of establishing delegated authority, consent and accountability for autonomous AI systems.

Article Topics

agentic commerce  |  AI agents  |  authorization  |  digital identity  |  identity security  |  Mastercard  |  Prove