The age of clicking “Buy Now” is ending. In the next wave of e-commerce, autonomous AI agents will negotiate, purchase, and pay on our behalf, all within parameters we set. But for this new era of agentic commerce to function safely, identity and trust must evolve just as fast. “You can’t have agents roaming the internet without proving who they represent,” says Nick Lambert, CEO of Dock Labs. “That’s where digital identity comes in.”
At Dock Labs, a reusable digital identity platform is being developed to allow people and organizations to issue and verify verifiable credentials: tamper-proof digital proofs of identity and authorization. What began as an effort to decentralize control over personal data is now finding a powerful new application: enabling AI agents to act on behalf of humans securely, transparently, and within legal boundaries.
A new era of commerce
Agentic commerce will transform how we interact with digital markets. Instead of searching, comparing, and buying products manually, users will delegate these tasks to AI agents that can act independently within defined rules. Imagine telling your personal AI assistant to book a trip with a maximum budget, preferred airlines, and travel dates. The agent would handle everything, from comparison to payment, and confirm only when the booking meets your criteria. This level of automation is already beginning to take shape, and according to Nick, it will only accelerate as digital identity and payment systems catch up.
The key challenge, however, is ensuring that these agents can prove who they represent and what they are allowed to do. A website or payment platform needs to know whether an agent is genuinely acting for a verified person or for a fraudster. Dock’s technology provides that missing trust layer through verifiable credentials and decentralized identifiers. These credentials are cryptographically secure and can be shared selectively, allowing an agent to prove that it is authorized to act for a specific person without exposing unnecessary personal data. “What we’ve built is a reusable identity platform,” Nick says.
Delegating authority to machines
This is where the parallels with Know Your Customer (KYC) processes become clear. Just as financial institutions verify individuals before allowing transactions, agentic systems will need to verify both the human user and their digital representative. Nick explains that this involves a form of delegated authority: the user verifies their identity once, then grants explicit permission to the agent, defining what it can and cannot do. The agent stores these permissions in a digital wallet, along with its own identity credentials, creating an auditable trail of accountability.
The payment networks are already preparing for this shift. Visa, Mastercard, and Stripe are exploring new types of agentic tokens and intent-based transactions that allow AI agents to initiate payments securely. The irony, Nick notes, is that for years these companies built systems designed to keep bots out, and now they are finding ways to let the right ones in. But the legal and technical challenges are significant. Current laws in most jurisdictions only permit the cardholder to authorize a transaction. To enable AI agents to act independently, regulations will need to evolve to recognize them as legitimate intermediaries.
Guardrails against fraud
Where money moves, risk follows. Nick warns that without guardrails, agentic commerce could trigger massive waves of AI-driven fraud. The ability to spin up thousands of fake agents, each making unauthorized purchases or scraping data, could overwhelm businesses that are unprepared. The solution, he says, lies in clear identity verification and robust standards that define how agents communicate and prove authenticity. “If you don’t lock this down early, it becomes a legal and financial mess,” he says. “Audit trails need to be in place so that in the event of an error liability can be established and proven.”
Despite the risks, Nick sees enormous potential for agentic commerce to improve user experience. He expects travel to be one of the first industries to adopt it at scale, since the process is structured, repeatable, and often frustrating for users. More complex sectors, such as insurance and healthcare, will follow later, once privacy and regulatory issues are resolved. The pace of development, he believes, will outstrip that of decentralized identity’s early years. “There’s a real demand from people to hand off repetitive digital tasks,” he says. “The technology is ready, and businesses know there’s money to be made.”
The future of digital identity
At Dock Labs, the strategy is not to pivot but to extend. The company continues to serve identity verification and access management clients while adapting its platform for AI-driven use cases, Nick says. The core mission remains unchanged: give people ownership of their data and make digital interactions more seamless and secure. Whether it is a person logging into a platform or an AI agent making a booking, the principle is the same: trust must be built on verified identity.
In the coming years, Nick expects to see AI agents handling many routine transactions on behalf of users, from booking travel to renewing subscriptions. The groundwork being laid today by identity companies, payment networks, and regulators will determine how safe and efficient that future will be. “It’s all about improving the user experience,” he says. “We want technology that works for people, not the other way around.”