Wal-Mart hopes that your robot can shop for you.
On Wednesday, this retail giant announced the launch of two new tools to help third-party AI agents shop on behalf of customers: Agent Profiles ( agent profiles ) and Agent Gateways ( agent gateway ).
Wal-Mart stated that the proxy files will link all transactions to the robots that execute them, and will allow Wal-Mart customers to manage authorization and spending limits in the same way they manage additional users on their credit card accounts.
Wal-Mart's move stands in contrast to Amazon's practices. Recently, Amazon blocked the use of the proxy tool Muse by Meta to access its website, stating that such proxy activities violated Amazon's terms of service. Amazon has also taken countermeasures against other third-party proxies, including suing Perplexity, as well as restricting proxies from Google and OpenAI.
In a statement, Walmart said: "As customers begin to use agents to help them with their shopping, we are working to establish connections, permissions, and options to complement these tools and support the ways in which customers wish to use them."
The company also stated that this gateway will protect the customer information held by Walmart, providing only the data necessary to complete specific transactions. Specifically, the gateway can share relevant patterns or preferences with agents—such as the laundry detergent brands favored by customers—but will not share their complete purchase history with agents.
The company also listed a set of terms and conditions regarding how the AI agent should operate during shopping.
According to these terms, Walmart states that it will continue to follow its usual return policy, and the prices displayed by agents on Walmart.com will always be the same as those seen by human users.
