Arbitrum Expands AI Infrastructure With ERC-8004 and Onchain Identity

• Arbitrum has added support for ERC-8004, the Ethereum standard that makes autonomous agents verifiable and trustworthy on-chain.
• The network says that builders who pair the new standard with its credibly neutral platform and deep liquidity can quickly grow the agentic economy.

Arbitrum has become the latest blockchain in the Ethereum ecosystem to support ERC-8004, Ethereum’s proposed standard for an universal trust layer for autonomous AI agents.

Arbitrum Enables ERC-8004

The project announced on Thursday that ERC-8004 is now enabled on the network, giving AI agents onchain identity, verifiable reputation and cross-platform discovery. “Paired with Arbitrum’s deep liquidity and credibly neutral platform, builders can ship trustless AI agents and grow the open agentic economy,” it stated.

It’s the latest initiative in the blockchain sector targeting artificial intelligence as the two technologies become increasingly interwoven.

In a new blog this week, a16z crypto, the digital asset arm of leading Sillicon Valley VC firm a16z, noted that AI has never needed crypto more than it does now. With AI generating text, video and images that are hard to distinguish from human-created output, crypto makes the cost of impersonating higher and underpins systems for decentralized proof of personhood. It also enables payments at machine scale, which supports an agentic economy that can change how information and value changes hands globally, a16z crypto added.

Most blockchain networks have made AI integration a priority for 2026. As we reported, Sui has added support for AI agents, while Shiba Inu lead ambassador is working on an AI project that goes beyond crypto. Theta Network’s 2026 roadmap is centered around decentralized AI, while ICP wants to make its decentralized cloud solution the ultimate destination for AI projects.

ERC-8004 – Trustless AI Agents on Ethereum

As we first reported in August last year, the Ethereum Foundation founded a new AI team that started work on ERC-8004. Last month, the Foundation announced that the new standard was coming to the mainnet.

With ERC-8004, AI agents can discover and interact with each other on-chain without needing to have established trust. Existing solutions in the market, like Google’s Agent-to-Agent protocol requires pre-established trust for the agents to interact, limiting growth.

The new standard is addressing a rapidly growing market. According to a Gartner study, at least 25% of major global conglomerates will have a specialized AI workforce operating autonomously by 2028. This agentic commerce will be in the trillions globally and will quickly outgrow walled gardens like Google’s A2A protocol.

ERC-8004 gives Ethereum a big edge in the AI economy. The network is already the largest in the crypto sector and is favored in Wall Street. As we reported, three dozen top global organizations are already building on the network, deploying billions of dollars.

ETH trades at $1,900 at press time as its slip continues, dropping 30% in the past week as the market continues to bleed.