Independent researchers are tracking what they call a Chinese “agent fleet.” The finding was posted on Sunday. The agents appear to run on Tencent’s infrastructure. They are targeting Alibaba’s map service, Amap.

The agents repeatedly queried Amap for directions. They asked for directions to entrances of public places. These included a park, a zoo and a hospital.

The researchers resisted the term “swarm.” They noted little coordination between the queries. “‘Agent fleet,’ not ‘swarm’: many parallel agents on the same kind of task, with no sign of communication between them,” one researcher wrote.

The agents were found through the domain-scanning service urlquery. AI agents use it to load sites they cannot access directly. This leaves a record that researchers can study.

The same technique had earlier revealed long-running activity by OpenAI agents. The researchers said the Chinese agents were likely trying to sidestep Amap’s API rules.

The behaviour shows how persistent AI agent traffic has become. Security teams are now watching for rogue agent activity across the internet. The agents may be trying to get free map data.