Websites decide which AI agents they let in, and a smarter AI does not change that. Expect an uneven internet with open and closed doors.
Why this is useful to know
More and more websites no longer let AI agents in just like that. A smarter AI does not change this, because a website decides for itself who gets which access. According to this video, there will be no open internet for agents, but an uneven landscape in which some doors open and others stay shut. One cause, according to Jones, is that AI makes it easier for attackers to break into websites. He refers to what he calls Black October. For you as a business owner, this means you do not only have to choose which assistant you use. You also need to check whether that assistant can actually handle orders, bookings and payments with your suppliers.
When you need this
Say your employee has an agent book a hotel or place an order, and the site blocks the agent halfway through. Then your process stalls. Check in advance whether your key suppliers and booking sites let agents in. Agree on what an agent is allowed to do: which amounts, which suppliers and which time frame. Look at payment methods with restrictions, such as payment tokens that only work for one seller or one amount. Do you have a website yourself and want agents to place orders or request quotes? Then decide what they can and cannot see, such as prices or availability. Start with one process and test it first, before you roll it out more widely.
How it works under the hood
There are three layers: recognition, authorisation and payment. For recognition, infrastructure such as Cloudflare can give an agent request a digital signature. That way a website can check where the request comes from and apply rules to agent traffic. For authorisation, the website decides per request what is allowed, such as reading prices, booking or cancelling. For payment, protocols such as Google's Agent Payments Protocol work with signed instructions and records. Stripe's shared payment tokens come with limits on seller, amount and expiry date. There is no shared schema yet, so an agent gets through at one service and not at another. For your own setup with tools and guardrails, this means: record per service which actions the agent may take, and log everything. Also watch out for data leaks: an agent working on a site with sloppy instructions can give away data that does not belong there.
This news touches chapters 7, 24 and 21 of the course AI(l) or nothing by Newway. If you follow the course, this subject returns there at a calmer pace.
What you can do with this
Want to know what this means for your business? Plan an introduction: half an hour, no sales pitch, but an honest answer to the question where to begin. Rather read on first? The course AI(l) or nothing is free and starts with the basics.
Written in response to a publication by Nate B Jones (YouTube): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3HHFL_lsLM
