NIST's Center for AI Standards and Innovation announced the AI Agent Standards Initiative on February 17, 2026, to develop industry-led technical standards and protocols for AI agents that can work autonomously for hours, write code, manage emails, and shop for goods. The initiative focuses on three pillars: facilitating industry-led agent standards development, fostering open source protocol development, and advancing AI agent security research, with upcoming RFIs due March 9 and April 2, 2026. This represents the first major federal framework for standardizing autonomous AI agents across the digital ecosystem.