TLDR: Visa, in partnership with Cloudflare, has launched the Trusted Agent Protocol, a new framework aimed at securing and streamlining transactions initiated by artificial intelligence (AI) shopping agents. This protocol is designed to help merchants authenticate legitimate AI agents, distinguish them from malicious bots, and provide crucial context for agent-driven purchases, addressing the complexities of the rapidly expanding AI in online retail.
SAN FRANCISCO – October 14, 2025 – Visa Inc. (NYSE: V) today announced the introduction of its Trusted Agent Protocol, a groundbreaking framework developed in collaboration with cloud-computing connectivity provider Cloudflare Inc. This new protocol is set to revolutionize agentic commerce by establishing secure communication channels between AI shopping agents and merchants during every stage of a transaction.
The initiative comes at a critical time, as AI-driven traffic to U.S. retail websites has surged by over 4,700% in the past year, with 85% of shoppers who have utilized AI for online purchasing reporting an improved experience, according to Adobe Data Insights. This rapid growth, however, has presented merchants with new challenges, including managing bot detection systems that can mistakenly block legitimate AI-initiated transactions, supporting agent-driven guest and logged-in checkouts, and maintaining visibility into the consumer behind the agent and their payment data.
The Trusted Agent Protocol aims to directly address these issues by enabling approved AI agents to securely transmit critical information to merchants. This provides a much-needed framework for recognizing trusted agents with genuine commerce intent, thereby distinguishing them from malicious automation and rogue bots. The protocol leverages agent-specific cryptographic signatures and allows agents to provide merchants with additional context, ensuring transactions are as seamless and secure as traditional consumer-initiated payments.
Jack Forestell, Chief Product & Strategy Officer at Visa, emphasized the industry’s collective responsibility: “We believe the entire payments ecosystem has a responsibility to ensure sellers can trust AI agents as much as they trust their best customers and networks.” He added, “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. Our new agent protocol is focused on creating no-code functionality for merchants to securely identify agents with an intent to buy and provide a better payments and personalized experience for its known users.”
Stephanie Cohen, Chief Strategy Officer at Cloudflare, echoed this sentiment, stating that the protocol is “a vital step in building the necessary guardrails” for the emerging AI commerce ecosystem. Cindy Turner, Chief Product Officer at Worldpay, further highlighted the importance of trust, noting, “Agentic commerce will quickly become the channel of choice for many consumers looking to shop, but its future adoption and scale depends on trust.”
Built upon the foundational HTTP Message Signature standard and aligned with Web Both Auth, the Trusted Agent Protocol is designed to integrate with existing web infrastructure, requiring minimal user experience changes on merchant websites or checkout pages. It is also extendable to non-web message protocols. The protocol is now available through the Visa Developer Center and GitHub.
Visa is committed to making this protocol an interoperable part of the broader agentic commerce ecosystem. Beyond its collaboration with Cloudflare, the company is actively working with global standards bodies such as the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), OpenID Foundation, and EMVCo to ensure its protocol complements others and promotes ecosystem-wide adoption. Visa is also collaborating with partners like Coinbase to ensure interoperability with protocols such as x402, and has received insightful feedback from early partners including Adyen, Ant International, Checkout.com, Fiserv, Microsoft, Nuvei, Shopify, CyberSource, and Elavon.
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This innovation underscores Visa’s strong financial performance, with the company maintaining an impressive 97.78% gross profit margin, 11.38% revenue growth, and a 53% return on equity in the last twelve months, according to InvestingPro data. The Trusted Agent Protocol represents a significant step forward in securing the future of AI-driven commerce, fostering trust and efficiency in an increasingly automated retail landscape.
