Adapted from my LinkedIn writing and related technical material. Read original on LinkedIn ↗
My post on agentic payments raises an architectural question: how should a payment system recognize and constrain software acting for a customer?
Define delegated authority
An agent needs a verifiable identity and a specific scope of permission. Keep customer consent, transaction limits, allowed actions, and expiry explicit.
Control execution
Authenticate the actor, validate the instruction, apply risk controls, and preserve an audit history. Revocation should have a defined effect on future and in-flight actions.
The practical priority is accountability: who authorized the action, what the agent could do, and what evidence explains the result. An intelligent interface does not remove those responsibilities.