Coinbase’s AI-focused payments protocol x402 is becoming an open, standardized infrastructure under the Linux Foundation, a nonprofit center for open source software development. This move aims to create a community-governed ecosystem for high-frequency, micro-transactions that traditional finance cannot effectively handle.
The protocol has established an initial governing body, the x402 Foundation, which includes internet services company Cloudflare and payments giant Stripe, and is backed by a long list of other large players.
As AI-driven businesses continue to expand, the industry has become interested in X402. In particular, so-called agent payments, executed autonomously by AI agents, are a hot topic, especially in certain areas of the cryptocurrency industry where programmable, blockchain-based micropayments are believed to make the most sense.
x402 is designed for these payments. Instead of using ChatGPT as a front-end for a traditional shopping cart, it can process transactions worth just a fraction of a cent at a high frequency that traditional credit card networks would struggle to manage.
Now, by using the Linux Foundation to expand the open source ecosystem, x402 aims to solve potential interoperability issues by creating something like Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) for AI agents—in other words, a standard technology for encrypting connections between web servers and browsers.
“The Internet is built on open protocols,” said Jim Zemlin, CEO of the Linux Foundation. “The x402 Foundation will create an open, community-governed home to develop these capabilities in an open manner, ensuring that they evolve with transparency, interoperability, and broad participation across the entire ecosystem.”
Coinbase said in a press release on Thursday that other members of the foundation will be made up of players from multiple verticals, with initial interest and support including Adyen, Amazon Web Services, American Express, Ampersend.ai, Ant International, Base, Circle, Fiserv Merchant Solutions, Google, KakaoPay, Mastercard, Merit Systems, Microsoft, Polygon Labs, PPRO, Sierra. Shopify, Solana Foundation, Thirdweb and Visa.
“The shift to agent commerce requires cloud infrastructure to be as open as the protocols it supports,” said James Tromans, managing director of Web3 and Digital Assets at Google Cloud. By joining the x402 Foundation, Google is strengthening its commitment to interoperable standards that enable secure, AI-driven transactions across platforms. “
