OAuth Tokens Alone Are Not Enough to Give AI Agents a True Identity

As AI agents increasingly act across multiple systems — calling tools, retrying tasks, and making decisions autonomously — OAuth tokens alone cannot fully answer who is acting, under whose authority, and for what purpose. Reusing human credentials for agents creates serious accountability gaps, since logs may falsely attribute actions to a person rather than an automated process. Security frameworks like OWASP's Agentic Top 10 for 2026 now treat identity and privilege abuse as a distinct risk category specific to agentic systems. Experts argue that operational agent identity requires a stable identifier, a clear authority chain, bounded purpose, short-lived credentials, and a reliable audit trail — not just a valid token. Standards bodies including the IETF are developing guidance on agent authentication and authorization, though no finished standard yet exists.