Cloudflare has joined forces with Visa, Mastercard, and American Express to develop authentication protocols for “agentic commerce,” an emerging sector where AI software agents execute purchases on behalf of users.
The San Francisco–based firm said on Oct. 14 that it worked with Visa on a new Trusted Agent Protocol, enabling merchants to verify AI-powered shopping bots through its Web Bot Auth standard. Mastercard and American Express are introducing similar integrations for their own networks, according to a company statement.
The collaboration extends Cloudflare’s growing involvement in digital payments and blockchain infrastructure. The company recently disclosed plans to issue a NET Dollar stablecoin and has partnered with Coinbase under the x402 Foundation to establish standards for machine-to-machine transactions.
Building the Framework for Agentic Commerce
Agentic commerce describes a category of transactions handled by autonomous AI systems that can search, negotiate, and pay for goods or services. Cloudflare said these agents will require programmable, verifiable payment channels that support real-time settlement and compliance with existing payment networks.
“The future of commerce is agentic, and Cloudflare is building the trusted foundation for it,” said Stephanie Cohen, Cloudflare’s chief strategy officer. The initiative aims to align card networks, fintech processors, and blockchain issuers on shared authentication rules for AI payments.
Alongside the card schemes, early partners include Adyen, Checkout.com, Circle, Fiserv, Microsoft, Nuvei, Shopify, Webflow, and Worldpay, forming a coalition of payments, software, and crypto companies developing interoperability standards for agent‑led transactions.
Crypto and AI Convergence
Cloudflare’s push follows growing interest in merging artificial intelligence with blockchain‑based financial systems. Earlier this year, Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino said he expected “one trillion AI agents” to use Bitcoin and USDT over the next 15 years. Such projections have accelerated efforts to design infrastructure that allows AI entities to hold, transfer, and account for digital assets autonomously.
Cloudflare’s NET Dollar project, revealed in September, will be integrated with its identity and bot verification products to allow compliant, traceable payments between human users and AI‑driven systems. The firm’s collaboration with Coinbase through the x402 Foundation is intended to establish open protocols for these interactions, including stablecoin‑based micropayments.
What Comes Next
By working with Visa, Mastercard, and AmEx, Cloudflare is positioning its network as a neutral layer for verifying and routing agentic payments across both traditional and crypto systems. The Trusted Agent Protocol is expected to be introduced to developers and payment processors in early 2026, pending testing within select commerce platforms.
While the technology is still in its early stages, Cloudflare’s expansion into authentication and settlement infrastructure places it among a small group of companies defining how AI‑driven transactions could operate securely at scale. The partnership reflects the growing overlap between cloud networking, payments, and decentralized finance — sectors converging around the same goal of automating trust in digital transactions.