April 15, 2026 — Team Octopus won the overall first-place prize at the inaugural Anthropic × Kaszek hackathon in Latin America, co-hosted by Digital House in Buenos Aires. The winning project, AgentPay, applies security checks to payments initiated by AI agents. Oktsec founder Gustavo Aragón developed it alongside Ignacio Aracena, Nicolás Spagnuolo, Mauro Proto Cassina and Sebastián Buffo Sempe.
The prize included USD 150,000 in Anthropic API credits for the team and USD 2,000 in cash from Kaszek. The credits amounted to USD 30,000 per team member. This recognition was awarded for AgentPay at the event.
The award went to a five-person team that combined three Universidad de San Andrés students with two professionals from the fintech and technology sectors. Working within the event’s limited timeframe, they brought together the technical implementation, business case and presentation of AgentPay.
A shared effort across business and engineering
Ignacio, Nicolás and Sebastián focused on the business case, value proposition and pitch. Mauro and Gustavo worked on the technical build. The students played a substantial role in both the development and the way the team presented the problem, alongside Sebastián’s experience in business and fintech and Gustavo’s background in product, technology and cybersecurity.
AgentPay built on security research and open source work Gustavo had begun with Oktsec in February 2026. The hackathon provided an opportunity to apply that work to a specific task: checking a payment before an AI agent executes it.
The problem behind AgentPay
An agent making a payment may handle credentials, read information from external services and call tools that move money. A changed recipient or amount can turn an intended transaction into an unauthorized one. The team’s objective was to check those details at the point of execution, rather than rely on the agent’s instructions alone.
Developed as a Claude Code plugin, AgentPay inspected supported tool calls routed through it. Its deterministic rules checked payment amounts, frequency, recipient changes, exposed credentials and signs of external manipulation. Each decision was recorded in a hash chain so the attempted action and the reason for the decision could be reviewed afterward.
The result was a working hackathon prototype that connected a concrete financial use case with a broader security question: how should organizations control agents that can act on their behalf? The work demonstrated the team’s approach to that question within the event’s scope.
Continuing the work at Oktsec
The approach behind AgentPay remains central to Oktsec: define what an agent is permitted to do, apply checks to sensitive actions and retain evidence for review. Gustavo’s experience building in the Brazilian fintech sector informs that focus on operational controls and accountability.
Oktsec recognizes the contribution of every member of Team Octopus and thanks Anthropic, Kaszek and Digital House for creating a space for developers and entrepreneurs in Latin America to build together.
About Oktsec
Oktsec develops security controls for AI agents, combining research and open source software with tools for authorization and verifiable audit records. Learn more at oktsec.com.
Further information: Founder’s account and prize details · AgentPay repository · Hackathon website
Press contact: info@oktsec.com.