Google Cloud Launches Agent Payments Protocol to Secure AI-Driven Transactions

Google Cloud has unveiled the Agent Payments Protocol (AP2), a new open standard designed to secure agent-led payments as artificial intelligence increasingly takes on financial tasks for users. Built in collaboration with over 60 global partners—including Accenture, Confluent, Mastercard, PayPal, Coinbase, American Express, and Revolut—the protocol establishes a payment-agnostic framework for authenticating, authorising, and validating AI-driven transactions across platforms.

Unlike traditional payment systems, which assume a human initiates a purchase, AP2 addresses the complexities of AI agents acting on behalf of users. It ensures authorization, authenticity, and accountability in every transaction, helping prevent fraud and miscommunication. Central to the system are Mandates—cryptographically signed contracts that capture user intent and approval, creating a verifiable audit trail from purchase request to final payment.

For example, users can authorize an agent to buy concert tickets the moment they go on sale or monitor product availability under set price conditions. AP2 then ensures that only the approved terms are executed, giving merchants and financial institutions confidence in the process.

The protocol also supports a wide range of payment methods, including credit cards, real-time bank transfers, and stablecoins. In partnership with Coinbase, Google has extended AP2 for Web3 payments, enabling secure crypto transactions via a new A2A x402 extension.

By establishing a universal framework, AP2 aims to prevent a fragmented ecosystem and unlock new commerce opportunities. Google has invited the wider payments and technology community to collaborate via its public GitHub repository, where the full technical specifications are available.

 “Adobe is proud to work with Google to advance secure and authenticated agentic commerce - our role in the Agent Payments Protocol (AP2) underscores our commitment to trusted, AI-driven experiences. With Adobe Commerce and AI agents powering customer journeys, we are focused on delivering secure, reliable, and authentic transactions for businesses and consumers," Loni Stark, VP of Strategy and Product at Adobe, said.

"Airwallex is thrilled to support Google’s Agent Payments Protocol (AP2). This is a critical step forward in building a secure, interoperable ecosystem for agentic AI payments. This protocol gives businesses and consumers the confidence to delegate tasks to AI agents, aligning with our mission to build the future of finance by empowering businesses globally,” Jacob Dai, Co-Founder & CTO at Airwallex, said.

"Confluent is excited to support Google in this effort to build an open, secure, and high-trust payments protocol. Agent Payments Protocol (AP2) aligns perfectly with our vision of a real-time data-driven world, and we believe our expertise in data streaming with Apache Kafka will be critical in creating a resilient and scalable payments ecosystem for the agentic web," Pascal Vantrepote, Partner CTO at Confluent, said.