Summary
EPAA launched an APAC working group with HSBC to develop standards for agentic payments — AI-initiated transactions. The group will address liability, identity, authentication, authorization, and fraud detection over an 18-month engagement with ASEAN and APEC governments. Policy proposals due November 2027.
Key Points
- Initiative: EPAA AI & Agentic Payments Working Group
- Founding member: HSBC
- Scope: APAC region; banks, payment networks, fintechs, technology platforms
- Core problem: no agreed standard for liability when AI agent exceeds mandate
- Key issues:
- Agent identity: how to identify and authenticate an AI agent
- Authorization: what mandate does the agent have?
- Liability: who is responsible when agent exceeds mandate?
- Fraud detection: can monitoring tools distinguish legitimate agent activity from compromised accounts?
- Dispute handling: how to handle transactions initiated by software rather than a person
- Timeline: 18-month engagement with ASEAN and APEC governments
- Policy proposals: November 2027 (51st ASEAN Summit, APEC Economic Leaders' Week)
- Committee: 10-12 organizations; working group: up to 30 organizations
- Context: HSBC + Mastercard tested B2B agentic commerce in May 2026 (Singapore)
- Alipay's AI Pay: exceeded 120M autonomous transactions in single week (February 2026)
- Key question: will standards be interoperable across APAC's diverse regulatory regimes?
- What to watch: whether working group attracts participation from China's major platforms