Banks warn AI shopping agents outpace fraud protections

Banks warn AI shopping agents outpace fraud protections

Tue, September 22, 2026 at 4:58 PM GMT+3 2 min read

• COF -2.22%
• CBA.AX -1.80%

A coalition of major banks warned on Tuesday that AI-powered shopping agents are creating new risks for consumers around scams, fraud, and data privacy — and that the technology is moving faster than existing industry standards and consumer protections can keep pace.

The group includes NatWest, Bank of America, ING, Capital One, New Zealand's ASB Bank, and Commonwealth Bank of Australia. The banks published a report laying out principles for how agentic commerce — in which AI tools select and purchase goods on a shopper's behalf — should be developed, and said they plan to bring a series of proposals to policymakers.

"Consumers are unclear if AI will act in their interests," the report said. "They are concerned that AI agents may buy the wrong thing or spend too much — or even worse, lose their money to scams and fraud. They are not sure whether they will be protected or who they will need to go to if things go wrong."

Among the vulnerabilities the report flagged: AI agents that collect card details from customers and submit them on third-party sites, and the risk that agents might favor payment options that carry fewer consumer safeguards, according to Reuters. Bad actors could also compromise or impersonate AI agents and merchants, or deploy new methods of social engineering, the banks said.

"When things go wrong, there is unclear and inefficient allocation of liability, and disputes processes do not involve all relevant parties across the value chain," the banks added.

The group plans to bring several proposals to regulators, including mandating that consumers be told when an AI agent is part of a transaction, clearer insight into how those agents reach their decisions, and measures to keep customer data secure. The report further argued that consumers and merchants should retain autonomy over which AI commerce platforms they adopt, and that competing systems ought to work seamlessly with one another.

The warning comes as technology companies including OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, and Meta are promoting AI chatbots as shopping tools, and retailers are moving to shape those chatbots' recommendations, according to Reuters. British retailer John Lewis said searches from AI agents had risen to 2.5% of its total from 0.3% a year earlier.

Consumer adoption of AI in shopping remains uneven. Research from PYMNTS Intelligence showed that half of American consumers reported completing a retail purchase with some form of AI help, yet only about one in four said they would be comfortable handing both the shopping and the payment entirely over to an AI agent, according to PYMNTS.

The banks' report arrives as U.S. regulators are also intensifying their attention on AI in financial services. Banking examiners have incorporated AI oversight into routine bank examinations, pressing lenders on how they govern the technology across higher-risk functions — though no AI-specific rulebook has yet been written.