Mastercard and Google Are Building the Trust Layer for AI That Spends Money

Mastercard and Google Are Building the Trust Layer for AI That Spends Money 16% of U.S. consumers trust AI to make payments on their behalf. Not because they don't understand the technology—because they don't understand what the AI will actually do. Will it book the flight I asked for, or also add travel insurance I didn't authorize? Will it buy the specific product I selected, or the "best" one according to criteria I never approved? This isn't an AI capability problem. It's a trust infrastructure problem. Mastercard and Google just open-sourced a piece of that infrastructure: Verifiable Intent. What Verifiable Intent Actually Does The framework creates cryptographic proof that an AI agent is operating within bounds a human explicitly authorized. Think of it as a digitally signed power of attorney with machine-enforceable constraints: Amount caps: The agent can't spend more than $X without re-authorization Merchant allowlists: The agent can only transact with approved vendors Category