{
  "id": 139220,
  "title": "Cloudflare just launched a permanent ID tool and wallet for AI shopping",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/08/04/cloudflare-just-launched-a-permanent-id-tool-and-wallet-for-ai",
  "topic": "ai",
  "section": "AI",
  "published": "2026-08-04T13:00:00.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "Fortune",
    "slug": "fortune",
    "url": "https://fortune.com/2026/08/04/cloudflare-ai-agents-wallets-id/"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "Cloudflare has introduced a new identity tool, cloudflare.pay, designed to equip AI agents with the ability to shop online, as well as a wallet to hold funds for these agents. This development marks a significant shift in the internet's landscape, where bots now make up around 57% of web traffic. The rise of AI agents has created new business opportunities, as Stephanie Cohen, Cloudflare's chief strategy officer, emphasizes the need for a new payment model to support these interactions. The cloudflare.pay service provides users with a bot-readable identity and a virtual wallet, funded by a bank transfer that converts into stablecoins. Users can then grant permission to their agents to access the wallet and make purchases. The wallet also features optional guardrails, such as spending limits and a whitelist of approved merchants. Cloudflare has also developed AI tools to help merchants communicate with customer agents seeking information or making purchases. While basic versions of agentic commerce have existed previously, the capabilities of AI agents have expanded in recent years, prompting a reevaluation of the internet's structure. This new bot-first internet could potentially lead to data being sold piecemeal to thousands or millions of AI agents, as bots do not mind carrying out numerous individual transactions. Short-term, tech-savvy developers and AI companies are likely to be at the forefront of agent-driven commerce, with ordinary consumers expected to follow in due time. To facilitate this growth, companies like Cloudflare must create user-friendly shopping agents, while also addressing regulatory concerns and enabling merchant companies and payment processors to adapt to the new bot shopping economy.",
  "summary": "The new service makes it easier for consumers to equip AI agents with tools that let them spend and identity themselves to merchants’ agents.",
  "key_points": [],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 2,
    "also_reported_by": [
      {
        "outlet": "Techmeme",
        "title": "Cloudflare announces Cloudflare Wallets for users to pay for APIs and content via stablecoins, with the ability to create virtual wallets for agentic shopping (Jeff John Roberts/Fortune)",
        "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/08/05/cloudflare-announces-cloudflare-wallets-for-users-to-pay-for-apis-and",
        "published": "2026-08-05T03:10:00.000Z"
      }
    ]
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}