Akamai announces Agentic Security Framework to Power Trusted AI-Driven Interactions and Commerce

As AI agents increasingly act on behalf of users, every request raises critical questions of identity, intent, and trust. To address this, Akamai announced its unified agentic framework for its Bot & Agent Control solutions, which connects identity, observability, trust, and edge security into a single, real-time decisioning layer to power scalable AI-driven interactions at the edge.

Six tightly integrated pillars form the framework, which are delivered through a coordinated ecosystem of partners:

Verified identity and human attribution: Through its collaboration with Visa, Akamai is establishing a trusted foundation by authenticating AI agents for secure, permissioned transactions. Integrations with frameworks like Visa’s Trusted Agent Protocol are helping define how agents operate in payment environments, setting clearer standards for authorization, permissions, and transaction-level trust. Akamai is also collaborating with Skyfire and Experian to strengthen trusted AI agent identity through the “Know Your Agent” (KYA) framework, which provides a standardized way for agents to declare identity, origin, and intent, linking them to the platforms they operate on and the users they represent. KYA can help ensure that an AI agent is not only legitimate but is also verified as acting on behalf of a specific, authorized individual. This provides the accountability required for merchants to process automated transactions safely.

User-centric authentication: To maintain security during the handoff between a human and an AI agent, Akamai integrates with identity providers such as Auth0 and Ping Identity. These integrations allow businesses to apply existing security policies, such as behavioral analysis and multi-factor authentication, to the AI agents their customers use. This ensures that the agent’s actions remain consistent with the user’s established identity, behavior, and intent.

Adaptive trust analysis: The framework enables organizations to dynamically determine the trustworthiness and intent behind every interaction across browsers, bots, and agents. This shifts beyond binary decision-making toward a spectrum of trust that puts the user at the center, allowing customers to identify which interactions support business outcomes and which introduce abuse, fraud, or operational risk.

Edge-based enforcement: Security and performance requirements for AI interactions are being met through Akamai’s distributed edge network. By utilizing high-performance compute, Akamai can evaluate the risk and intent of an agentic request instantly. Processing these decisions at the edge, Akamai helps businesses maintain security and control without compromising the speed of the user experience.

Content monetization and value exchange: As AI models and agents consume more web content, the framework provides a path for fair compensation. Through partnerships with TollBit and Skyfire, Akamai enables publishers and content owners to negotiate access and facilitate tokenized, pay-per-request models. This allows businesses to monetize their data while providing AI agents with the licensed access they need to function.

Operational visibility and traffic analysis: Through TrafficPeak and our industry-leading web security analytics, Akamai provides organizations with a unified view of their web traffic, distinguishing between human users, beneficial AI agents, and malicious bots. These high-scale log analyses allow security and business teams to observe how agents interact with their sites over time, providing the data necessary to refine access controls and commercial strategies.

“AI agents are replacing clicks, acting and handling commerce for us. For that to work, businesses need to recognize not just the agent, but who is behind it and what it’s trying to do,” said Patrick Sullivan, VP, CTO of Security Strategy, Akamai. “We’ve built this so that identity informs visibility, visibility drives trust, and trust powers the decisions that let companies safely grow and monetize these new AI interactions. We’re giving businesses the confidence to open their doors to AI without compromising security.”

Across its ecosystem, Akamai is helping businesses move toward a unified approach to managing bots, agents, and users. The result is a scalable model where every interaction is verified, understood, and acted on in real time.