Overview
- The ICO’s latest report says autonomous assistants could make purchases, book travel and manage household finances with limited prompts.
- The regulator plans close oversight through 2026 and will work with developers to clarify legal duties, saying strong compliance could become a market differentiator.
- A TLT survey of 100 major UK retailers found 49% investing in agentic AI, while only 15% deem payment contracts fit for such transactions and 45% say responsibility is unclear.
- Industry efforts are advancing, with OpenAI developing agentic commerce capabilities and Perplexity launching Comet, an AI browser for autonomous online tasks.
- Retail habits and competition are shifting as Capgemini reports about a quarter of consumers used generative AI shopping tools in 2025, and Amazon has blocked rival AI crawlers to protect its advertising ecosystem.