Arattai’s Biggest Security Overhaul Nears Completion, Says Zoho CEO

Zoho Chief Executive Officer Sridhar Vembu announced that the company's homegrown messaging platform called Arattai has achieved the final rollout stage for system-wide default-enforced End-to-End Encryption (E2EE). The update is one of the biggest architectural changes in the app, which is currently undergoing final internal testing with the deployment expected in some time.

In a detailed update shared on X, Vembu explained that the team has chosen "Option 2," where end-to-end encryption will be mandatory for all conversations. The rollout will begin with one-on-one chats and later extend to group chats. Explaining the scale of the change, Vembu said, "We had to do some redesigning and wanted extensive testing because this is a major change."

According to him, the original method of encrypting data was working well, but challenges arose in the migration workflow and file transfer process when encryption was made mandatory. These problems were discovered during testing conducted by approximately 6,000 Zoho employees. In a follow-up post, Vembu explained, "The issues encountered were with the mandatory switch-over process and difficulties transferring large files. The switch-over process has now been improved."

A new build that addresses these issues is now being tested internally. If this phase runs smoothly, the update will be released to all users, but with a forced upgrade. Vembu said, "This will be a forced upgrade for everyone because it's a major change."