“I always frame it as the little engine that probably shouldn’t have.”

Recorded at Checkout's Thrive event in Newport Beach, I sat down with A.J. Hernandez of Outlook Amusements, the company behind CaliforniaPsychics.com. A.J. has spent 21 years there, starting in the catalog and phone-order days, and today he handles both payments and fraud as a one-person team.

We get into how an online psychic business went from a risky reputation to a clean entertainment MCC, why fraud and acceptance are really the same conversation, and what it takes to stop promo abuse without scaring off good customers. I also share a few approaches I’ve used in the past, and we talk about how bad actors are testing more than just cards these days.

We also cover what the new card network monitoring programs mean for smaller merchants, why California regulation makes life harder for merchants, and what’s coming for payments in 2027.

Follow A.J Hernandez: https://www.linkedin.com/in/a-j-hernandez-2425b660/

--------------------------------------------

Thank you to our sponsor, whobilled.me. Ever spot a charge on your online banking or credit card statement that you don’t recognize? Go to whobilled.me and look it up before you call your bank or file a dispute. It’s free and takes seconds.

--------------------------------------------

"Most of the time when a new regulation comes through, it’s the little guy that gets smashed.”

AI agent traffic grew 7,851% year over year, and 95% of it is landing on retail, media, and travel sites. Frank Walsh, Field CTO at HUMAN Security, joins Jordan to talk about what happens when your customers stop visiting your website and start sending AI agents to do it for them.

This is a conversation four years in the making. Frank and Jordan have shared the stage at MRC three times, and this time they get into agentic commerce, bot management, and why the old "block every bot" playbook is now costing merchants sales. They cover which AI platforms are sending the most traffic (OpenAI, Meta, Anthropic, Perplexity, Google), how agents quietly run up costs on consumption-based tools, and what happens when an AI shopping agent fills in the blanks on a vague prompt all by itself.

They also get into "gray hat abuse": traffic that isn't malicious but still wrecks your analytics, affiliate programs, and site performance. On the other side, if your site blocks the wrong bots, the AI agents recommending products might never see yours.

Frank closes with three predictions for where agentic AI goes next. One of them will change how you think about the traffic hitting your site today.

If you work in fraud prevention, payments, ecommerce, cybersecurity, or trust and safety, this one is for you.

Get The 2026 State of AI Traffic & Cyberthreat Benchmark Report here: ⁠https://www.humansecurity.com/learn/resources/2026-state-of-ai-traffic-cyberthreat-benchmarks/⁠

--------------------------------------------

➡️ See a charge on your online banking or statement you don't recognize? Find out who it is and how to get ahold of them at www.whobilled.me

--------------------------------------------

“Everyone thought about bots as something we used to take tickets from people that really wanted them. Now bots are our partners in just about getting anything done."

-------------------------------------------- Inquiries: sponsorships@fraudboxer.com

--------------------------------------------

#AgenticAI #AIAgents #FraudBoxer #FraudPrevention #BotManagement #Cybersecurity #AgenticCommerce #Ecommerce #Payments #FraudPodcast #CybersecurityPodcast #PaymentsPodcast #HUMANSecurity #BotDetection #BadBots #GoodBots #AITraffic #AIShopping #AIShoppingAgents #WebScraping #Scraping #AccountTakeover #FakeAccounts #TrustAndSafety #MerchantRisk #PaymentFraud #EcommerceFraud #OnlineFraud #FraudFighter #RiskManagement #CyberThreats #ThreatIntelligence #AIGovernance #AISecurity #ArtificialIntelligence #AI #OpenAI #ChatGPT #Anthropic #Claude #MetaAI #Gemini #Perplexity #MCP #FutureOfCommerce #RetailTech #TravelTech #FinTech #TechPodcast #MRC

When the keynotes wrap up and the jackets come off, the real payment industry shows up. Recorded poolside at ⁠Checkout.com⁠’s Thrive event at the Pendry in Newport Beach, Jordan sits down (stands up) with Arthur Bedel for a raw, late-afternoon chat on what actually drives results in finance tech.

Ditching corporate jargon for drinks by the pool, Arthur talks straight about the business. Outside observers might think processing transactions is dry, but behind the scenes, growth comes down to culture, clever engineering, and solid trust. From quick checkouts to high-value networking, they talk about why top partnerships happen over good food and honest conversation instead of formal boardrooms.

Arthur also breaks down his latest project: building a media-driven accelerator designed to take back-end infrastructure, turn it into engaging content, and grow the biggest brands in the space.

Links to Arthur:

Instagram: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/arthur-bedel/⁠

Monyz: ⁠https://monyz.co/