Artificial Intelligence Agents are being adopted by Kenya’s Central Bank (CBK) to help in processing payments, fraud detection, credit risk assessment and customer service.
Robert Mudida the CBK Director of Research said on Monday, that despite adoption of AI agents, the bank would maintain human oversight over decisions made using the technology.
“Agentic AI is at the highest level because these agents are being trained to take over critical decisions that are being done by human beings,” said Mudida.
“It has great opportunities but also great dangers, so we are going slowly, but there are opportunities of using agents in areas like payments,” Mudida said.
Kenya’s financial regulator is also exploring more than 300 artificial intelligence applications to improve operational efficiency, including testing a new AI-powered chatbot.
“We are trying to move as fast as possible, but we are very aware of AI governance, which is very important to ensure the security of data,” Mudida noted.
CBK’s Research Department is already using AI for microforecasting in volatile economic conditions and nowcasting to fill data gaps and provide the Monetary Policy Committee with near-real-time information on the state of the economy.
The regulator’s exploration of AI agents comes as financial institutions increasingly use artificial intelligence to support payment processing, fraud detection, credit risk assessment and customer service.
