Tag Archives: ramp

Somewhat It Whys: The Intent of AI Agents

I missed a golden opportunity.

In mid-August I wrote the post “Beware, Amazon: Credit Has Been Extended Beyond Humans” that details how Mercury and Ramp are extending credit cards to non-human AI agents.

What could go wrong? Plenty. But there are ways to mitigate potential issues, as PYMNTS notes.

“A valid card credential may tell an issuer that an artificial intelligence agent can pay. It does not necessarily tell the issuer whether the AI agent should make this particular purchase.”

Ah, intent. Sounds like the “somewhat you why” test that I proposed for human identities.

Which gives me another excuse to hawk my book. Just remember that the book “Proving Humanity: The Six Factors of Identity Verification and Authentication” ONLY covers human identities.

For more information, click the image below.

Four pages from "Proving Humanity: The Six Factors of Identity Verification and Authentication" by John E. Bredehoft, Bredemarket. Click on the image to purchase.

Beware, Amazon: Credit Has Been Extended Beyond Humans

If you are staunchly declaring that your company will NEVER do business with a bot, forget it. The bots have credit cards now.

Yes, the credit card industry, which (before the Equal Credit Opportunity Act of 1974) would not let women apply for credit cards in their own names, is now starting to extend credit to non human identities.

PYMNTS:

“Mercury this week gave artificial intelligence agents something companies routinely give new employees: a corporate card of their own. Extending that perk to an agent, not a person, is new. Agent cards treat the agent exactly like that new hire, with its own payment credential, its own spending limits and its own audit trail, separate from any human on the team.”

And Mercury isn’t the only company issuing such cards.

“Ramp is issuing scoped virtual cards through its Visa partnership that external AI agents can use within policy guardrails set by a company…”

Robocredit. Google Lyria. Public Domain.

For those who worry about misuse, humans can misuse corporate credit cards also. And if this means that more entities will buy from your company, and possibly buy more rapidly…why should you complain?

Well, unless you’re Amazon. But as of now, Amazon has failed in its attempt to ban Perplexity AI shopping agents, so it’s fighting a losing battle.