PAP vs TAP: Personal Agent Protocol vs Visa’s TAP

This is the closest cousin on the list. Both TAP and PAP exist because businesses can’t tell a customer’s agent from a scraper. They just attack it from different ends.

What each one does

Visa and Cloudflare introduced TAP in October 2025. Agents sign their HTTP requests using Web Bot Auth, an IETF draft built on HTTP Message Signatures (RFC 9421). The merchant checks the signature and knows which agent is calling, plus some consumer and payment context.

PAP’s answer is a session. The customer signs in, or uses credentials already set up with the agent, and grants read-only or write access. The business then knows who sent the agent and how far it may go.

Why the difference matters

Look at Amazon’s complaint about Muse in September: the agent didn’t identify itself while browsing. A request signature fixes the "who is this bot" half of that. It doesn’t say what the customer allowed. A consent session covers the second half but doesn’t, on its own, sign every page load.

Our read: these probably stack rather than compete. Neither camp has said so publicly.

Quick answers

Is Visa part of PAP?

Visa isn’t named on either PAP partner list.

Does PAP use Web Bot Auth?

The announcement doesn’t mention it. It names OAuth for the session.

Which one stops scraping?

Neither blocks anything by itself. Both give a business the information to decide which agents to let through.

Other comparisons

• All agent protocols in one table
• PAP vs MCP (Model Context Protocol)
• PAP vs A2A (Agent2Agent)
• PAP vs UCP (Universal Commerce Protocol)
• PAP vs ACP (Agentic Commerce Protocol)
• PAP vs PACT (Personal Agent Consent & Trust Protocol)

pap.md is independent and not affiliated with Sierra, Meta or any PAP partner. Facts here come from the sources listed on each page.