Google and Ant International Launch AP2 Protocol for AI-Driven Payments

Google and ANT International have introduced the Agent Payments Protocol (AP2), a groundbreaking framework aimed at standardizing secure transactions executed by AI agents. The collaboration targets critical gaps in digital payments—user intent verification, traceability, and accountability—while enabling autonomous commerce at scale.

AP2's real-world applicability is being tested via Alipay+ Voyager, where AI agents book and pay for travel services. Antom further bolsters the ecosystem with open-source tools supporting card, wallet, and conversational transactions. This marks a paradigm shift from AI's traditional roles in fraud detection toward direct transactional autonomy.

The protocol's emphasis on auditable payment flows addresses longstanding trust barriers in decentralized finance. As AI agents gain transactional agency, AP2 could catalyze institutional adoption of blockchain-adjacent technologies—though regulatory scrutiny may follow.