Visa and Mastercard want to give artificial intelligence bots more control of Australians' bank cards, in a technological advancement they say could 'revolutionise' shopping.
Global digital payments giant Visa has announced its new artificial intelligence agents platform, that will allow consumers to task autonomous bots with spending their money for them. Visa and Mastercard want to give artificial intelligence bots more control of Australians' bank cards, in a technological advancement they say could "revolutionise" shopping.
The world's leading digital payment companies separately announced plans late last month to develop AI technology to streamline modern retail and allow autonomous agents to spend shoppers' money for them. Mastercard has also unveiled its own version of an AI agent, which will use 'agentic tokens' to keep users' banking information safe.The companies say AI agents could become as commonplace as contactless payment technologies, like Apple Pay and Google Pay, and are hopeful their corporate partners in Australia will embrace them in coming months. So, how could AI play more of a role in how we spend our money? And are there risks of it going wrong? Here is what we have been told.on April 30, saying it will allow shoppers to "have AI agents browse, select, purchase and manage on their behalf". "AI agents can find, shop and buy for consumers based on their pre-selected preferences," he said in a statement.The platform is being developed by Visa in partnership with other major global tech companies like Microsoft, OpenAI, Perplexity and Samsung. The company says shoppers will be able to set tasks for the AI agent, such as finding a specific item, researching a holiday itinerary, or filling out a weekly grocery list. Customers can then include an instruction in that task for the AI agent to spend their money for them, to purchase that product or service. Mastercard says agentic tokens is based on the same technology that already allows people to use 'Tap and Go' and contactless payment services., is called "Agent Pay" and also allows for a consumer to chat with an AI bot to set custom parameters for how they want it to shop on their behalf. Agent Pay incorporates a bigger focus on secure transactions using "Agentic Tokens", which apply unique one-time codes to prompts given to the AI so that a person's secure data stays safe and banks and retailers can correctly identify the spender.Mr Forestell said AI agents will not take over the entire shopping experience. He believes they could, however, prove useful for automatically completing errands that bore some people or are too complicated. Ivana Tranchini, Visa's head of client engagement in Australia, told the ABC that the Intelligent Commerce platform will allow for consumers to manually action their own security checks so they have the final say on when their money is spent.If you’ve been avoiding artificial intelligence systems, this is what experts have to say about how they could make your life easier. "It comes down to what the consumer wants. I could decide I want to get an 'OK' opportunity just before purchase is made based on all of the different parameters I've already put in place, so I can control that," she said.Both companies say the platforms will need traditional banks and retailers to trust the technology and agree to roll it out among their customers.Most Australian shoppers are not direct customers of Visa and Mastercard — but they do use technology developed by the companies that is built into their bank cards and facilitates retail transactions. Both payment companies say they are confident their Australian clientele, including the likes of the big four banks, will approach AI agents with an open mind and support the technology. "As the proliferation of AI continues to accelerate, we do expect that consumers and businesses are going to increasingly use this type of technology for commerce," Federico Cohen Freue, Mastercard's senior vice-president of pricing and investment strategy, told the ABC.Mastercard global and Visa say conversations with Australian companies to take up the technology are ongoing. But the ABC understands significant discussions involving either Mastercard or Visa and the big four banks have not commenced. An ANZ spokesperson said: "ANZ constantly explores new technologies to benefit our customers, however we carefully evaluate each one to understand its potential uses, risks, and to ensure it meets all legal and regulatory standards."The Commonwealth Bank, Westpac and the National Australia Bank all told the ABC they had no comment to make regarding Visa and Mastercard's announcements. Technology commentator Trevor Long, from the EFTM.com website says he expects Australia's banks to approach AI agents cautiously due to the potential risk it poses to their customers., the ACCC, in 2016 to boycott the use of Apple Pay — which is now one of the most commonly-used digital payment platforms in the country — as an example of their hesitance to embrace new technologies. "While I do think it will happen, I don't think they're going to rush towards it," Mr Long told the ABC. "They will want to truly understand the breadth of the technology, its abilities and the risk that it poses to them as the financial institution. "Banks are risk-averse and they're very keen to stop fraud … not just because they're protecting the customer, but because they're protecting their own resources. "They don't want to spend man-hours on tracking down fraud when they can prevent it in the first place."Yes, customers could lose money if the parameters set for an AI agent aren't specific enough or do not request a final approval from a shopper before funds are spent. Both payment companies say their platforms are user-led, so the AI only operates on instructions a shopper gives them in order to spend their money. The companies also say they simply develop new spending technologies and offer them to their clients, and cannot control customer behaviours in how they choose to spend their money.Artificial intelligence is a scammer's newest tool as experts warn they can generate fake photos, voice clones, phishing emails and fake websites “at an increasingly rapid rate”. Ms Tranchini said Visa was developing its Intelligent Commerce technology in the United States through different "use cases" to see what could go wrong and how it could be fixed. While Visa has its own fraud and transaction anomaly detection technologies, Australian consumers would still need to raise disputes with their banks who would then engage with Visa to track down lost money, Ms Tranchini said. "We know that the only way to make this technology work is if people trust it, and the only way to make people trust it is if we ensure that they feel protected, that very little or nothing goes wrong and that they've got the ability to get their money back," she said. "When someone goes to make a transaction today, on our network we're assessing up to 500 different data points in that transaction to make sure it is who they say they are, the transaction makes sense and follows the pattern on that credential and that if anything untoward is happening, we've got a way to block it — we do that today.Mastercard says it has hatched a five-year plan to replace traditional, 16-digit bank card numbers with dynamic, one-time 'agentic tokens'.Mr Cohen Freue said Mastercard's agentic tokens act like one-time barriers to make sure a transaction happens as a customer wants it to, and to ensure there is an extra layer of security to a person's details on top of the checks banks already apply.to "transform payments in Australia" that includes a push to get rid of traditional 16-digit bank card numbers and replace them with these dynamic one-time tokens."You'll be able to go, 'I want a card number that is only used for streaming services' boom, you'll get a special card number. You don't have to apply for a new card or a new account, you just have another card number on your existing account," he said.. Mr Long said he was concerned digital payment companies handing over control of a person's finances to AI could increase that figure. "If I was a financial services minister, I would be very concerned about automated purchasing by AI on a credit card,"When will AI agents be rolled out in Australia? The short answer is that both Visa and Mastercard don't know. Neither company has a date set for the technology to be rolled out in Australia. Mr Long said he believed "agentic tokens" used to safeguard customers' details and prevent fraud "will be here within a year". "That will happen pretty quickly, it's really just nailing the technology and proving it to the banks," he said. "The 'agentic AI', working for me, doing things without my explicit instruction, is a lot further off. "I just don't see how that gets adopted quickly in a world where we're already nervous about AI, we're already nervous about scams and spending. That's a way off."Analysis by Brett WorthingtonPhoto shows A drawing of Sean Combs, wearing a pale blue jumper, making a heart sign with his hands while standing in court.Photo shows An illustration of a scammer and a robot highfiving while popping out of a phone
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