Major Banks Partner to Establish Safety Rules for AI Shopping Assistants
Amsterdam, Wednesday 23 September 2026
Six global banks, including ING and Bank of America, have launched a unified framework to secure and standardise autonomous financial transactions executed by shopping AI agents.
A Collaborative Blueprint for Autonomous Transactions
The rapid evolution of artificial intelligence has moved beyond conversational queries to autonomous transactional execution, a phenomenon known as agentic commerce [2]. To navigate this new frontier, a coalition of six leading global financial institutions has published a shared set of principles [1][2][3]. This alliance includes the Netherlands’ ING Group, Bank of America, NatWest Group, Capital One, Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA), and its New Zealand-based subsidiary, ASB Bank [1][2][3]. The unified framework aims to establish critical guidelines that ensure consumer security, data protection, and user control as autonomous AI agents begin executing transactions on behalf of human users [2][3].
The Five Pillars of Trust in Agentic Commerce
To build consumer and merchant confidence, the participating banks have identified five core areas essential for the responsible development of agentic commerce: transparency, safety, privacy and data protection, customer choice, and interoperability [2]. According to Mark Monaco, head of global payments solutions at Bank of America, establishing trust across this emerging ecosystem will require thoughtful approaches to identity, authorization, fraud prevention, liability management, and customer protection [3]. The framework is designed to ensure that both customers and merchants retain complete choice, control, and flexibility regarding how they pay and get paid [3].
Testing the Waters with Pilot Programs
While broad consumer availability of agentic commerce was not observed in the European Economic Area (EEA) during the third quarter of 2026 (specifically between 1 July and 18 September 2026), several pilot-scale initiatives have successfully demonstrated that agent-led payment journeys can function on existing European payment infrastructure [4]. For instance, on 2 July 2026, Worldline, ING, and Visa conducted a live end-to-end Proof of Concept (PoC) in Germany using Visa Payment Passkey for user authentication [4]. On the same day, CaixaBank and Visa executed Spain’s first agent-initiated transaction using real card data and Visa Intelligent Commerce systems [4].
Adapting Payments Infrastructure for the Future
The success of agentic commerce ultimately depends on the strength and adaptability of the underlying payments infrastructure, as noted by Jonathan Oram, executive general manager of corporate banking and payments at ASB Bank [3]. Industry providers are actively shifting from simple payment processing toward protocol translation and trust orchestration [4]. This shift was highlighted on 14 September 2026, when Worldline launched its Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP) payment handler [4]. Additionally, Mastercard introduced its ‘Agent Connect’ initiative in September 2026, focusing on maintaining merchant control over pricing, fulfilment, and customer relationships, with initial availability focused in the United States [4].