Mastercard Expands Agent Pay with New AI Risk Insights to Secure Agentic Payments

Mastercard Introduces Intelligence Layer for Agent Pay

Mastercard has announced a significant expansion of Agent Pay, its agentic payments program, by deploying new trust and intelligence services designed to bring greater transparency to AI-initiated transactions1

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. These services form the intelligence layer of Mastercard's Agent Pay Trust Framework, which integrates identity, intent, controls, execution and intelligence to establish trust across agentic commerce2

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. By combining identity, intent, behavioral and fraud insights, the AI-powered risk insights enable financial institutions and merchants to gain a clearer shared understanding of AI-driven commerce activity2

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Probability Score and Trust Signals Drive Authorization Decisions

The first service, currently being rolled out for testing in the United States, provides a probability score that indicates the likelihood a transaction was initiated by an AI agent, helping issuers confidently approve legitimate agent-led purchases2

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. The new agentic trust and intelligence signals help ecosystem participants assess whether activity aligns with expected behavior patterns and identify unusual activity involving the agent, merchant, credential or transaction that may require further review1

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. These capabilities support smarter authorization decisions while reducing unnecessary friction and providing more seamless consumer experiences1

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Building Consumer Confidence in Agentic Payments

Ann Johnson, executive vice president of security solutions at Mastercard, emphasized the importance of trust in AI-driven systems. "AI agents will make commerce more intuitive, efficient and personal -- but only if people and businesses can trust the systems acting on their behalf," Johnson stated1

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. "By adding new agentic intelligence and risk insights to each transaction, we are giving people the confidence to say 'yes,' however they choose to pay," she added1

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. Mastercard launched Agent Pay in April 2025 to unlock agentic commerce for consumers and businesses1

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How AI Shopping Agents Transform Commerce

Mastercard U.S. Co-President Chiro Aikat explained that AI shopping agents can take information about customer needs, identify suitable products, find where they are sold and move consumers into the merchant's digital experience to complete purchases using a card on file1

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. Mastercard has developed agentic tokens and standards to support agent-initiated transactions while keeping consumers in control of decisions1

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. According to a PYMNTS Intelligence report titled "Global Digital Shopping Index: The AI-Powered Shopper Has Arrived," 56% of consumers will let AI shopping agents compare products and 35% will let agents access saved payment methods1

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. These figures demonstrate growing consumer willingness to embrace AI-driven commerce, making the trust infrastructure provided by the Agent Pay Trust Framework increasingly critical for merchants and financial institutions navigating this transformation.