Ethereum developers are preparing to roll out ERC-8004, a new standard designed to help software agents find each other, prove who they are, and decide who to trust when operating on different systems.
The proposal introduces a simple idea. If AI agents are to transact, coordinate, and execute tasks autonomously, they need persistent identities and a shared way to build credibility – much like users, wallets, or smart contracts do today.
This comes as large companies rush to deploy AI agents in-house, with most systems still relying on closed identity lists, API keys or two-way trust agreements. This works within a business, but breaks down once agents have to coordinate across suppliers, chains, or jurisdictions.
ERC-8004 defines three lightweight ledgers that can live on the Ethereum mainnet or layer 2 networks.
ERC-8004 will be available on mainnet soon.
By enabling reputation discovery and portability, ERC-8004 enables AI agents to interact within organizations, ensuring credibility flows everywhere.
This paves the way for a global market where AI services can interact without gatekeepers. https://t.co/Yrl0rvnSxj
-Ethereum (@ethereum) January 27, 2026
The first is an identity registry, which assigns each agent a unique identifier on-chain using an ERC-721 style token. This identifier points to a logging file describing what the agent does, how to reach it, and what protocols it supports. Ownership of the identifier can be transferred, delegated, or updated, giving agents portable, censorship-resistant identities.
The second is a reputation registry, in which clients (humans or machines) can submit structured feedback on an agent’s performance. The ledger stores raw signals on-chain, while allowing more complex scoring and filtering off-chain. The objective is not to directly classify agents but to make reputation data public and reusable in all applications.
The third is a validation register, which allows officers to request independent checks of their work. Validators may include staked services, machine learning proofs, trusted hardware, or other verification systems. These results are stored on the blockchain so that other users can see what was verified and by whom.
The developers involved in the proposal present it as infrastructure rather than a market. ERC-8004 does not manage payments, pricing or business models. Instead, it provides common rails for discovery and trust, leaving monetization to higher-level protocols.
If adopted, the standard could push Ethereum further into a neutral infrastructure role – not only for financial contracts, but also for coordinating autonomous software agents in an increasingly fragmented AI ecosystem.
The ether of the network is trading just over $3,000 Wednesday afternoon in Asia, up nearly 3% in the past 24 hours.
