Cocoon: Pavel Durov’s Bold Plan to Free AI from Big Tech Control.
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Key Takeaways
Cocoon is a TON-based decentralized AI compute market where GPU owners earn TON for providing said compute.
Telegram is Cocoon’s first customer, planning to integrate the service this November across Mini Apps and chat features.
The network leans on confidential computing to protect data and resist the centralization of AI.
The reveal aligns with a broader, people-owned AI push echoed by Tether’s Paolo Ardoino.
Telegram founder Pavel Durov just unveiled the Confidential Compute Open Network (Cocoon), a decentralized AI compute network built on TON that pays GPU owners in crypto to run private AI workloads.
Pavel Durov announces a new project: Cocoon. | source: @Rus_Khairullin on X.
This development is a direct challenge to the cloud monopolies that currently dominate AI.
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Cocoon Explained: Durov’s privacy-first AI network on TON
Speaking at the Blockchain Life forum in Dubai on Oct. 29, 2025, Durov introduced Cocoon as a privacy-first AI network that lives on the TON blockchain.
His premise is simple: instead of funneling everyone’s prompts, data, and model runs through clouds run by big tech, users can provide GPU power to the network and get paid in TON. From there, apps and developers can buy low-cost, private AI services, and Telegram itself will be Cocoon’s first major customer.
Durov said Cocoon will launch in November 2025.
🎤 @durov, founder and CEO of @telegram, spoke at @BlLife_Forum 2025 about Telegram Gifts, MiniApps success, and the dangers of centralized AI.
Pavel announced Cocoon (Confidential Compute Open Network), a privacy-focused decentralized AI network powered by TON, launching in… pic.twitter.com/QUnpjwGL7J
Durov Positions Cocoon as a Decentralized Alternative to Big Tech AI
Today’s artificial intelligence clients run on a closed, vendor-run supply chain: GPUs and data centers run by the Amazons and Googles of the world. While centralization is efficient when it comes to speed and up-time, it’s also a chokepoint for high costs, censorship, and data control. If everyone’s using AI run by a few companies, they’re ceding control.
Durov framed Cocoon as part of Telegram’s mission toward digital freedom. A stance against centralization and the internet’s risk of becoming “the ultimate tool of control,” should infrastructure remain in the power of a few showrunners.
Pavel Durov on privacy. | Source: @durov on X.
Cocoon: Decentralized Compute Marketplace Powering Telegram’s AI Future
As a decentralized compute marketplace, Cocoon provides the following:
Decentralized compute market: GPU owners, which could be data centers or a single user, supply compute to Cocoon and earn TON for serving AI jobs. With over 1 billion monthly active users, that’s a lot of potential power.
Privacy by design: Cocoon aims to push AI tasks into confidential computing environments via decentralization.
Competitive pricing: Decentralized AI services allow for competitive pricing, rather than users getting locked into a few expensive cloud offerings.
Telegram integration: Telegram’s Mini apps system offers a slew of services usable within the chat app, with TON as the default payment system. Cocoon implementation will allow Mini Apps to utilize its AI services, keeping the entire process within the TON network.
It’s essentially Uber for GPUs. If you’re looking to summarize an important document, running it through ChatGPT can be a massive privacy risk: it’s stored on OpenAI’s servers and could leak at any time.
Cocoon matches your request with a verified GPU running inside a confidential compute environment, one specifically designed to protect your document. The provider can’t peek. You pay the provider in TON, get the summary back, and the environment eliminates that session, wiping your data entirely.
Tether and Telegram Align on a Shared Vision for People-Owned AI
Cocoon echoes a view shared by Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino at the Plan B Forum in Lugano, that people should own AI, not corporations.
“I want to see AI and robots happen,” Ardoino told CCN’s Lorena Nessi. “But I want people to own them, not corporations.”
Ardoino’s team is building QVAC, an open-source execution layer that aims to make AI portable across hardware and networks. Think of it like an operating environment that runs AI models and agents directly on your device rather than a corporation’s cloud network. Two solutions to the same problem: one offers a private marketplace, the other enables on-device use.
How Cocoon Will Transform the Telegram Experience for Users and Developers
If you’re a Telegram user or developer, here’s how your experience might change:
Private data: Developers can run custom Telegram bots without shipping user data to a third-party cloud.
Idle GPU utilization: Users with powerful GPUs can monetize downtime by lending idle power to Cocoon.
AI features: General users can expect AI features similar to X’s Grok and other AI bots within Telegram. Only prompts run through Cocoon and not a centralized backend.
Challenges Ahead: Balancing Decentralization, Governance and Economics in Cocoon’s Model
While Cocoon presents an ambitious vision for decentralized, privacy-first AI, its launch also raises several practical challenges. From maintaining service quality across a distributed network to addressing governance and economic sustainability, the platform will need to balance decentralization with reliability, compliance, and fair incentives to succeed.
Quality of service: As mentioned, centralization is great for efficiency. Can a decentralized network match the cloud-grade uptime and speed of a corporate-powered app?
Governance and policy: Durov himself has faced scrutiny from European authorities regarding alleged criminal activity on Telegram, and will likely receive some regulatory pressure around Cocoon’s content and access.
Economic balance: GPU owners need payouts that cover the cost of electricity it takes to finish a job. Conversely, developers need stable TON pricing so they can budget for Cocoon operating fees.
Incentive: Providers need an incentive to finish longer jobs, especially if token prices jump. Can they just leave a big job midway and jump to smaller ones if TON shoots up in price?
Durov’s Cocoon and Ardoino’s QVAC represent two different but philosophically aligned bets, both aiming to move AI out of centralized corporate clouds and into open networks and user-controlled environments.
Whether the future of people-owned AI lies in a decentralized compute marketplace like Cocoon or an on-device execution layer like QVAC remains to be seen, but both underscore a growing movement to return digital power to individuals rather than institutions.
Will GPU providers need to abide by KYC/AML policies to join Cocoon?
Most likely, if they want to receive payouts. Providers should expect verification policies and potential screening tied to their TON wallets.
Can Telegram bots/Mini Apps call Cocoon without leaving the chat?
That seems to be the case. Mini Apps can request AI services via TON payments and Cocoon APIs, returning results in chat.
How does pricing work if TON is volatile?
It will likely quote a TON/USD trading pair at execution time using oracles.
Will Telegram open-source Cocoon’s code?
Most likely. To represent true decentralization, third parties should be able to audit the code.
Disclaimer:
The information provided in this article is for informational purposes only. It is not intended to be, nor should it be construed as, financial advice. We do not make any warranties regarding the completeness, reliability, or accuracy of this information. All investments involve risk, and past performance does not guarantee future results. We recommend consulting a financial advisor before making any investment decisions.
Max Moeller is a Chicago‑based writer and video editor passionate about games, tech, and crypto. Whether it’s crafting clear, insightful articles or piecing together engaging video retrospectives, he’s driven by curiosity and takes pride in keeping things human. Since 2017, Max has been published in a variety of notable crypto magazines.
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