Svmuu News Mastercard has announced the launch of a new payment protocol called Agent Pay for AI, designed to enable artificial intelligence agents to conveniently make micropayments to each other, such as for pay-per-use access to website data. Mastercard Chief Product Officer Jorn Lambert stated that the project will not be a major source of revenue in the short term, but is expected to become a new, scalable market within the next five years. He also predicted that AI chatbots will eventually play a significant role in e-commerce transactions and could give rise to a payment ecosystem between bots.
It is reported that the protocol records the permissions granted by humans to AI agents on the blockchain, ensuring agents operate according to instructions. Initially, Mastercard has chosen to store this permission information on the Ethereum-based Polygon network. Other companies involved in developing the protocol include fintech firm Adyen, crypto exchange Coinbase, and web hosting giant Cloudflare. (Fortune)