Designing Intelligent and Secure Smart Payment Systems: An AI-Driven, Tokenized, and Compliance-Aware Framework for Real-Time Digital Transactions

Abstract: In the rapidly evolving digital economy, smart payment systems have become integral to financial transactions across industries. However, existing architectures often lack critical safeguards such as real-time threat response, comprehensive API security, and automated regulatory compliance. This study presents an advanced framework for intelligent, secure, and scalable smart payment systems that integrates artificial intelligence, blockchain, tokenization, and compliance-aware automation. The proposed model features AI-driven behavioral analytics for fraud detection, biometric and multi-factor authentication for secure user validation, and distributed ledger technology for transparent, tamper-resistant transaction logging. Secure API gateways enforce payload validation and rate limiting, while compliance modules ensure adherence to global standards like PCI DSS, PSD2, and GDPR. The implementation is validated through system simulations, performance benchmarking, and usability testing, demonstrating high fraud detection accuracy, low latency, and user-centric design. This research offers a practical roadmap for developing resilient, sector-adaptable payment systems that prioritize trust, transparency, and regulatory alignment in an increasingly complex threat landscape.