WhatsApp's new Incognito Chat runs Meta AI inside a Trusted Execution Environment that processes conversations in a way the company itself cannot access, marking a technical departure from how rivals handle private AI queries. The feature, announced Wednesday, builds on WhatsApp's Private Processing infrastructure that debuted last year. Users activate it by tapping a new icon in one-on-one chats with Meta AI. The standalone Meta AI app will also get the option.
Incognito Chat is ephemeral by default. Messages disappear when the session ends, and closing the app or locking the phone terminates the conversation entirely, wiping Meta AI's context.
"With AI, from a privacy standpoint, you'd want to run everything on your own phone, but the benefit of these models is using larger and larger compute to make them work," WhatsApp head Will Cathcart told WIRED. "The challenge is how do you build something in a data center that's not going to fit in your pocket but has the same types of security properties.
Incognito Chat is kind of like we're running a giant phone for AI and we don't have the passcode."
Most generative AI platforms now offer some form of incognito mode, including ChatGPT and Claude. But those features typically separate a user's identity from their queries while the provider still processes the data.
WhatsApp's approach uses confidential computing to shield the questions and answers from Meta's view entirely. The company says it can only see that an account used the feature.
Meta is using its latest Muse Spark model, released last month, to power Incognito Chat. Previous WhatsApp AI features relied on smaller models, according to Alice Newton-Rex, WhatsApp's VP of Product.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg wrote on Wednesday that "Incognito Chat handles all AI inference in a Trusted Execution Environment that ensures your messages are not accessible to us." He contrasted the approach with other disappearing AI products where "conversation logs often remain on other companies' servers for many months." For now, Incognito Chat is text-only. Cathcart said support for image processing and voice recognition is in development.
Reducing latency through optimized routing has been a focus to make the feature usable given the extra demands of running AI within a secure cloud enclave.
Incognito Chat also includes safety guardrails. Cathcart told reporters that the system will "steer the user towards helpful information if it can and then refuse (to answer) and eventually even just stop interacting with the user completely" when asked about harmful topics.
Users must confirm their age, as Meta does not allow users under 13 on its platforms.
Meta is already working on a related feature called Side Chat, which lets users invoke Meta AI privately within an existing WhatsApp conversation without notifying other participants. The company said Incognito Chats will roll out globally over the coming months.
