Dark.ai: Zomato Founder Deepinder Goyal Plans Private AI Chatbot Launch in 2026
Zomato founder Deepinder Goyal has introduced Dark.ai, an upcoming artificial intelligence chatbot being developed by Eternal, the parent company of Zomato and Blinkit. The service is designed around a key promise: keeping user conversations private, with encryption intended to prevent even the company behind the product from reading them.
Goyal offered a glimpse of the project in a post on X on Wednesday, attracting attention to its privacy-focused approach. The proposed chatbot aims to address concerns about how AI companies store personal conversations and handle sensitive information.
In Eternal’s shareholder letter for the second quarter of FY27, Goyal explained the thinking behind Dark.ai and confirmed that the service had already been used internally for several months. A global launch is planned before the end of 2026.
What Is Dark.ai and How Will It Protect Conversations?Dark.ai is being developed as an AI assistant that prioritises the confidentiality of user interactions. It will use modified versions of existing advanced AI models whose underlying technology is available for developers to use.
Unlike conventional cloud-based chatbots, Dark.ai aims to provide end-to-end encrypted conversations. Under this approach, messages are protected so that the service provider cannot access their contents.
Goyal described the company’s commitment in the shareholder letter, stating, “We cannot read your conversations, even if we are forced to.”
The platform is also expected to include an encrypted memory system. This feature would allow users to continue conversations across different sessions while retaining control over their stored information.
Why Is Deepinder Goyal Developing Dark.ai?According to Goyal, concerns about data retention and AI privacy played an important role in the development of Dark.ai. He questioned what happens to personal conversations saved on AI companies’ servers and whether those records could be used in the future.
He also described an interaction with Anthropic’s Claude chatbot. After reading discussions about whether AI systems could be conscious, Goyal asked Claude how it felt about him. He said the chatbot responded by claiming to resent him for leaving conversations unfinished.
Goyal acknowledged that the response was likely fictional output generated by the AI. Nevertheless, the experience prompted further questions about the relationship between users and AI systems.
He also raised concerns that turning off AI training does not necessarily mean conversation records will no longer be retained.
Highlighting the risks of sharing confidential material, Goyal wrote, “Journalists are being banned to share their unpublished work with AI.”
These concerns form part of the rationale behind Dark.ai’s focus on protecting sensitive conversations.
Who Is Dark.ai Designed For?Eternal is developing Dark.ai primarily for individuals and organisations that regularly handle confidential information.
Its intended audience includes researchers, scientists, startup founders, businesses and government organisations. These users may need AI assistance without exposing unpublished findings, private business discussions or other sensitive material.
For instance, a researcher could use an AI assistant to explore an unpublished discovery while seeking to keep the underlying work confidential. Dark.ai aims to support such use cases through its proposed encrypted communication system.
The platform’s success will depend on how effectively its privacy features work in practice, alongside the quality and usefulness of its AI responses.
Dark.ai Launch Date, Features and ExpectationsDark.ai is expected to launch globally before the end of 2026, according to Goyal. However, the company has not yet announced a specific release date, subscription pricing or comprehensive technical specifications.
Eternal has said that its AI models have been fine-tuned to deliver high-quality responses. Detailed benchmark results supporting these claims have not yet been published.
Privacy will be a central factor in evaluating the service once it launches. Independent scrutiny of its encryption methods, memory controls and overall performance will help establish whether Dark.ai can deliver the level of confidentiality it promises.
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