On September 10, 2026, in an announcement from São Paulo, Ant International, Visa, and Mastercard revealed they will collaborate on an interoperability framework called Know-Your-Agent (KYA) to verify and identify AI agents making purchases on people's behalf — aligning three agent-identity protocols that had until now been competing with each other.
Each network had been developing its own protocol separately: Visa with Trusted Agent Protocol, Mastercard with Verifiable Intent, and Ant International with Agentic Mobile Protocol. The KYA framework doesn't replace those individual protocols — instead, it aims to let card networks, digital wallet ecosystems, agent platforms, and marketplaces exchange AI agent identification and onboarding in a mutually compatible way, while each network keeps its own verification and decision-making process.
It's important to be precise about the current state: the announcement describes a framework under development, not a technical standard already deployed across the three networks. None of the participants disclosed an implementation timeline, pilot volumes, or a list of merchants or financial institutions testing it. What is explicit is the underlying motivation: AI agents are projected to orchestrate between $3 and $5 trillion in global consumer commerce by 2030, and without a shared verification mechanism, every network and every merchant would have to trust third-party agents blindly.
Carlos Montiel is an enterprise AI solutions architect. He implements LLMs, agents, RAG, and orchestrators for companies across Guatemala and Latin America. Get in touch for a consultation.
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