FP-Agent: Fingerprinting AI Browsing Agents

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Wang, Ethan, Shafiq, Zubair, Vekaria, Yash
Format: Preprint
Published: 2026
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author Wang, Ethan
Shafiq, Zubair
Vekaria, Yash
author_facet Wang, Ethan
Shafiq, Zubair
Vekaria, Yash
contents AI browsing agents are an emerging class of AI-powered bots capable of autonomously navigating websites. Unlike traditional web bots, AI browsing agents typically operate using real browsers and perform everyday tasks, making them difficult to detect. Yet little is known about whether existing AI browsing agents can be distinguished from humans and one another based on their browser or behavioral fingerprints. In this paper, we present the first controlled measurement study of seven AI browsing agents and human users. Using an instrumented honey website, we collect browser and behavioral fingerprint features while AI browsing agents and humans perform three tasks: flight booking, online shopping, and forum interaction. We then train FP-Agent, a multi-class classifier, to evaluate the discriminative power of these features. We find that browser fingerprints provide limited discriminative power when shared by multiple AI browsing agents. Behavioral fingerprints, however, are distinctive: differences in typing, scrolling, and mouse behavior separate AI browsing agents from humans and one another. In a case study evaluating Cloudflare's bot detection, FP-Agent detects all seven AI browsing agents, whereas Cloudflare detects only one. Our findings show that behavioral fingerprints are a critical component to reliably detect and control this emerging form of web traffic.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2605_01247
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle FP-Agent: Fingerprinting AI Browsing Agents
Wang, Ethan
Shafiq, Zubair
Vekaria, Yash
Cryptography and Security
AI browsing agents are an emerging class of AI-powered bots capable of autonomously navigating websites. Unlike traditional web bots, AI browsing agents typically operate using real browsers and perform everyday tasks, making them difficult to detect. Yet little is known about whether existing AI browsing agents can be distinguished from humans and one another based on their browser or behavioral fingerprints. In this paper, we present the first controlled measurement study of seven AI browsing agents and human users. Using an instrumented honey website, we collect browser and behavioral fingerprint features while AI browsing agents and humans perform three tasks: flight booking, online shopping, and forum interaction. We then train FP-Agent, a multi-class classifier, to evaluate the discriminative power of these features. We find that browser fingerprints provide limited discriminative power when shared by multiple AI browsing agents. Behavioral fingerprints, however, are distinctive: differences in typing, scrolling, and mouse behavior separate AI browsing agents from humans and one another. In a case study evaluating Cloudflare's bot detection, FP-Agent detects all seven AI browsing agents, whereas Cloudflare detects only one. Our findings show that behavioral fingerprints are a critical component to reliably detect and control this emerging form of web traffic.
title FP-Agent: Fingerprinting AI Browsing Agents
topic Cryptography and Security
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2605.01247