ChatGPT beats me - hands down

Certainly improved my "Why AI Agents Should Have Identity Wallets"

As AI agents become more integrated into workflows, services, and digital infrastructures, their trustworthiness and interoperability become critical. Identity wallets are the key to ensuring both.

AI agents are of limited utility unless they can:

• Be trusted through verifiable credentials

• Interoperate securely with other AI agents, people, and organisations

• Respect the legal and operational frameworks of the environments they act in

Just as your customers, suppliers, public sector entities, and employees will have ID wallets, AI agents must too. This enables seamless, secure interactions—automated yet accountable.

Legal Responsibility & Verifiable Transactions

AI agents, regardless of their intelligence or autonomy, cannot enter legally binding agreements. Ultimate responsibility always lies with natural or legal persons. That accountability is preserved through:

• Wallet-based transactions, where every action and data interchange is signed, time-stamped, and traceable

• Verifiable credentials, which support transparency and auditability across agents and domains

AI Agents as Employment Seekers

Deploying an AI agent is similar to hiring a new employee:

• It should present verifiable credentials (education, trust marks, capability proofs)

• It needs an ID wallet to carry those credentials and prove its authenticity

• The credentials should be interoperable with the organisation’s own systems and others in the ecosystem

• No need for technical integrations if wallet-to-wallet standards are followed

Data Access & Credential Use Cases

Different AI use cases demand different levels of security and credentialing:

1. Internal Use Only:

   • If the AI is only accessing internal data, minimal external verification is needed.

   • However, logging and wallet-based control still enhance traceability and governance.

2. External Data Collection or Sharing:

   • The agent must use its wallet to interact with outside parties.

   • Credentials like identification, power-to-act, and task-specific authorisations are essential.

3. Mission-Based Delegation:

   • Like employees on assignment, agents need time-limited, purpose-specific credentials.

   • The wallet ensures these are used only as intended, with audit trails.

4. Third-Party Agent Interactions:

   • External AI agents (or staff) presenting themselves must also show their credentials.

   • Wallet-to-wallet exchanges verify identity, authority, and trust in an automated, scalable way.

From Open Data to Behavioral Insights

Business and life events often require AI agents to collect and process a wide range of data—some of it open, some verified, and some real-time behavioral.

To manage this securely and efficiently:

• The AI agent needs smart access to data sources

• You need to control what’s collected and shared

• Identity wallets provide the framework for trustworthy, governed data flows

Toward an Agent-Driven, Trust-Based Digital Economy

Whether interacting directly with other organisations, AI agents, or individuals, the agent-based economy must be built on verifiable identity, authority, and trust. Identity wallets are the connective tissue that enables:

• Agent-to-agent transactions

• Cross-domain trust without deep integration

• Auditability, control, and legal assurance

This is not just a technical enabler—it’s a foundational requirement for data sovereignty, security, and scale.

Final Thought

What may seem self-evident now will soon be expected. Without identity wallets, AI agents will remain siloed, untrusted, and underutilized.

So rather than asking "why should AI agents have wallets?", we might ask:
How soon can we build the infrastructure so they do?