Transmit Security’s Blinded by the Agent research reveals a coming crisis: consumer AI agents are defeating traditional fraud detection. Enterprises are unprepared. The report details how AI agents (e.g., OpenAI ChatGPT Agent) operate on behalf of users across platforms, creating new blind spots. These agents bypass behavioral biometrics, device fingerprinting, and bot detection, which were designed for human behavior.
“Fraud controls today were built for a world where humans click the buttons. But now, AI is clicking them for us — and the systems can’t tell the difference between AI operated by legitimate users and AI operated by fraudsters,” said Mickey Boodaei, CEO and Co-Founder of Transmit Security. “If we don’t act now, the rise of agentic AI will break the fraud stack as we know it.”
The report unveils a stark warning predicting:
- Over 60% of online traffic to retailers is already bots, not humans. AI agents acting on behalf of consumers, that number is expected to surpass 90% in the near future.
- Fraudsters are shifting to legitimate AI agents, effectively blinding core detection layers.
- Up to 500% increases in fraud losses are projected over the next few years due to breakdowns in detection.
- Current fraud systems are flagging legitimate agent transactions, increasing false declines and harming customer experience. Fraud teams will face 2–3 times more operational workload over the next 12–18 months, to maintain current protection
“This is not just about fraud — it’s about trust,” added David Mahdi, CIO of Transmit Security. “When the AI agent becomes your user’s digital proxy, your systems must adapt. Identity, fraud, and authentication platforms need to be re-architected to recognize and verify intent — not just inputs.”
Key Insights from Blinded by the Agent:
- Behavioral biometrics fail when there are no human signals — a core flaw in an agent-driven world.
- Device fingerprinting breaks down, as AI agents run from shared cloud environments, appearing as “new devices” in every session.
- Bot detection filters will blindly approve known AI agents, without visibility into who’s behind them—legitimate users or fraudsters.
- Financial institutions and online merchants are unprepared, lacking predictive AI systems capable of detecting fraud hidden within agent-generated activity.
“We’re entering a world where every customer will eventually have their own AI assistant. If your fraud and identity stack can’t handle that shift, you’ll either drown in false positives or be blindsided by invisible fraud,” concluded Mahdi.
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