Key Takeaways Visa introduced the Trusted Agent Protocol on October 14, 2025, to enable secure communication between AI agents and merchants as AI-driven traffic to U.S. retail sites surges 4,700%. Th...
Visa has launched a new security protocol designed to authenticate artificial intelligence shopping agents as AI-driven commerce experiences explosive growth across the retail sector.
The Trusted Agent Protocol, announced Tuesday, aims to establish trust between merchants and AI agents at a time when automated shopping traffic has increased dramatically.
According to Visa, AI-driven traffic to retail websites in the United States has jumped more than 4,700% over the past year.
The company also noted that 85% of shoppers who have used AI to shop reported that it improved their shopping experience. However, this rapid adoption has created significant operational challenges for online merchants.
Jack Forestell, Visa's Chief Product and Strategy Officer, emphasized the industry-wide responsibility to adapt to this shift.
"We believe the entire payments ecosystem has a responsibility to ensure sellers trust AI agents with the same confidence they place in their most valued customers and networks," Forestell said in a statement.
"For the past year, we've worked closely with sellers, issuers, and partners to make sure agent-initiated transactions are as seamless and secure as any payment today."
The Trusted Agent Protocol was developed in collaboration with Cloudflare and addresses three critical challenges facing merchants in the age of AI commerce: managing bot detection systems that can mistakenly block legitimate transactions, supporting agent-driven guest and logged-in checkout processes, and preserving visibility into consumer and payment data.
The protocol enables approved AI agents to securely pass critical information to merchants using agent-specific cryptographic signatures.
This information includes agent intent, consumer recognition data indicating whether a shopper has an existing account or previous interaction with the merchant, and optional payment information to support a merchant's preferred checkout method.
Built upon the HTTP Message Signature standard and aligned with Web Both Auth, the protocol allows merchants and agents to establish trust using existing web infrastructure with minimal changes required to merchant websites or checkout pages.
Forestell noted that the framework is designed to provide "no-code functionality for merchants to securely identify agents with an intent to buy and provide a better payment and personalized experience for its known users."
Visa has received feedback from early partners, including Adyen, Ant International, Checkout.com, Coinbase, CyberSource, Fiserv, Microsoft, Nuvei, and Shopify.
The protocol is available now through the Visa Developer Center and GitHub, with agent onboarding already active and merchant integration resources accessible to developers.
While the initial specifications apply to the Visa network, the company emphasized its commitment to an open, ecosystem-wide approach.
Visa stated it is working to align closely with global standards bodies, including IETF, OpenID Foundation, and EMVCo, to ensure the protocol can extend beyond its own network.
The Trusted Agent Protocol represents the latest advancement in Visa's Intelligent Commerce initiative, which the company launched in April 2025 at its Global Product Drop event.
That broader program provides AI agents with payment rails, security controls, and post-purchase support to enable autonomous shopping on behalf of consumers.
The Intelligent Commerce platform includes features such as AI-ready cards that use tokenized credentials for enhanced security, identity verification to confirm an agent is authorized to act on a consumer's behalf, and spending controls that allow consumers to set limits and conditions for agent transactions.
The system also enables consumers to share purchase insights to improve agent performance and personalize shopping recommendations.
In September 2025, Visa expanded the program by introducing its Model Context Protocol Server, which allows developers to connect AI agents directly to Visa Intelligent Commerce APIs.
The company is also piloting an Acceptance Agent Toolkit that enables both technical and non-technical users to deploy AI-powered payment workflows using plain language commands.
Rubail Birwadker, Visa's Senior Vice President and Global Head of Growth, described the current moment as a fundamental reimagining of internet commerce.
"For the past 30 years, eCommerce has been about keeping bad bots out," he told PYMNTS. "Now, the challenge is flipped. The bots showing up represent consumers and real intent to buy."
The protocol launch comes as Visa seeks to maintain its dominant position in digital payments while commerce increasingly shifts toward AI intermediation.
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