In this new digital era, we’ve become increasingly comfortable implementing artificial intelligence into our daily lives. Professionally, we use AI tools to automate tasks. At home, we consult chatbots for answers to almost any question. There’s no doubt this evolving tech benefits merchants and consumers alike. Still, the question remains: would you trust AI with your finances?
Visa and Mastercard’s agent-based payments technology [1] Forbes. “Mastercard and Visa unleash AI agents to shop for you“. Accessed on August 25th, 2025 promises to automate the consumer shopping experience from start to finish. Whether buying groceries or booking travel, these agents are designed to research, compare, and purchase on behalf of the average shopper.
Key Takeaways:
- Mastercard’s Agent Pay utilizes a strong security network built around “agentic tokens” to ensure secure and transparent transactions.
- Visa’s Intelligent Commerce enables AI models like ChatGPT to access Visa credentials via a “delegated authorization” model.
- Federal Trade Commission data show that losses tied to online shopping fraud hit around $750 million in 2024.
- 74% of reported global organizations use AI to detect financial fraud.
This feature may be revolutionary for society, freeing us from mundane errands to pursue more high-level tasks and passion projects. However, if not adequately regulated, it could also lead to an uptick in eCommerce fraud and chargeback scams. To better understand how it will impact consumer and business culture, let’s dive into Visa and Mastercard’s AI shoppers, what they mean for merchants, and what the future of commerce holds.
Mastercard’s Agent Pay: What to Expect
Imagine you own a small textile company that typically orders materials overseas—through Mastercard Agent Pay, your AI agent will handle the sourcing and finalizing of payment terms and organize shipping logistics with an international supplier for you. The agent will complete the purchase with a Mastercard virtual corporate token, and your cost-efficient, expedited delivery will arrive.[2] Mastercard. “Mastercard unveils Agent Pay, pioneering agentic payments technology to power commerce in the age of AI“. On August 25th, 2025
Although giving AI this amount of autonomy may seem odd, this outlines a typical scenario when using Agent Pay’s token technology.
Mastercard’s Online Fraud Solutions
According to the Federal Trade Commission, fraud losses related to online shopping reached around $750 million in 2024, part of a record $12.5 billion in overall consumer losses[3] Yahoo Finance. “Mastercard CFO Says Shoppers Ready To Abandon The Web Browser In Favor Of AI Agents: ‘Paradigm Shift’ Unfolding“. Accessed on August 25th, 2025 . Mastercard has implemented guardrails to counteract this trend.
Tokenization
Mastercard Agentic Tokens enable payments through conversational interfaces like voice or chat. All parties—from consumers to merchants and processors—can identify agent-facilitated transactions, making fraud easier to detect. Mastercard also partners with acquirers and platforms like Braintree and Checkout.com to strengthen tokenization and security.
Identification
Mastercard’s cybersecurity and authentication tools help protect merchants and consumers from fraud. Its agents use on-device biometrics for accurate customer authentication and flag suspicious transactions. Verified consumers also unlock benefits like product recommendations, free delivery, rewards, and discounts for merchants.
Authentication
This program will allow Mastercard to securely register and authenticate its agents before they make a purchase. Clear consumer control parameters will be established, allowing customers to decide how and when they buy.
Visa’s Intelligent Commerce: What to Expect
With Visa’s Intelligent Commerce program underway, the card network aims to revolutionize the payments industry by leveraging its decades of trust and experience.
“Just like the shift from physical shopping to online and from online to mobile, Visa is setting a new standard for a new era of commerce. Now, with Visa Intelligent Commerce, AI agents can find, shop, and buy for consumers based on their pre-selected preferences. Each consumer sets the limits, and Visa helps manage the rest.” – Jack Forestell, Visa’s Chief Product and Strategy Officer
By connecting their Visa credentials to AI models like ChatGPT, shoppers can find the perfect sweater or book the ideal honeymoon in significantly less time. Visa also works with AI industry leaders like Anthropic, IBM, Microsoft, Mistral AI, OpenAI, Perplexity, Samsung, and Stripe to provide shoppers with a more personalized, secure AI commerce experience. This can benefit merchants if these chat models refer customers to their businesses.
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Visa’s Online Fraud Solutions
Visa aims to empower merchants and consumers by creating a simple, secure, and personalized commerce experience.
AI-Ready Cards
Tokenized digital credentials replace traditional card details to boost consumer security and simplify integration for developers. They authorize a designated agent to act for the consumer, enabling AI-powered identity verification. Control remains solely with the consumer, who decides how their credentials are used.
AI-Powered Personalization
In this scenario, the consumer remains in control, sharing basic Visa spending and purchase information to enhance agent performance and tailor shopping recommendations.
Secure AI Payments
Consumers can set spending limits and rules, giving agents clear transaction guidelines. Visa receives real-time commerce signals, allowing immediate transaction controls and improved dispute management.
Fraud and Chargeback Risks
Despite many institutions’ best efforts to combat financial fraud, there remains a tremendous risk. According to a 2024 Biocatch financial crime survey, 51% of reported organizations lost between $5 million and $25 million to AI-based threats in 2023. 91% of banking institutions are reevaluating their use of voice verification, due to criminals’ talent for voice cloning. And 69% believe that fraudsters are more equipped to use AI for financial crimes than banks are at stopping them[4] Biocatch. “2024 AI, Fraud, and Financial Crime Survey“. Accessed on August 25th, 2025 . On the consumer end, 71% of scam victims were deceived into giving personal information due to the sophistication of current phishing attacks [5] Payments Journal. “Breaking the Rules: Why Organizations Must Think Outside the Box to Combat Fraud“. Accessed on August 25th, 2025 .
With these staggering insights, it’s understandable to question whether Visa and Mastercard’s efforts to prevent eCommerce fraud are enough. Their agent technology is new, but financial institutions are working around the clock to get smarter and faster at securing credit card processing.
Did you know…
Currently, 74% of global organizations use AI to detect financial crimes, creating more opportunities to learn how fraudsters operate and develop strategies against them. Still, even if most fraud decreases, other issues could arise.
With consumers placing so much of their trust in AI shoppers, there could be a higher risk of chargebacks or chargeback scams. Maybe the customer doesn’t remember requesting the order. Maybe they get buyer’s remorse and contact their banks. Either way, this can hinder merchants who need a paper trail that is as transparent as possible when accepting payment. It’s too soon to tell if chargebacks will become a larger problem, but merchants should stay alert and ensure their systems are updated with the latest security and compliance tools.
AI and the Future of Commerce
Whether Visa and Mastercard’s AI agents are positive for the marketplace overall, they will clearly become part of our new reality. The commerce landscape is changing quickly, with AI shopping and the increasing digitalization of consumer culture.
Mastercard has begun rolling out numberless debit cards, leaning into its tokenization technology. Gen Z is switching to alternative online payment methods, like Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL), giving buyers flexibility when paying. Google is also launching new AI shopping assistant tools, which connect to Gemini via AI Mode and come with realistic virtual try-on options [6] Axios. “Google upgrades AI tools for shopping“. Accessed on August 25th, 2025 . Ultimately, consumers will continue to gain more opportunities to simplify and offload their spending, further depersonalizing the relationship between customer and merchant.
This progression may give retailers pause, but there is also an inevitability that commerce will continue to grow more virtual, and AI will play a significant part in that. As time progresses, fraud prevention tools should continue to get savvier to follow suit, but one question remains: where will we draw the line?
