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Pronto’s newest investor co-founded a US robotics AI startup. The startup recently doubled its valuation to $200 million. The timing set off alarm bells.
Customers pay Rs 29 extra per booking to opt in; workers get additional pay too. Crucially, consent must be reaffirmed before every single booking. (AI image)
A small pilot programme, a head-mounted camera, and a leaked investor memo have combined to raise a question Indian home-services users never thought they would have to ask: is someone training a robot with footage from inside my house?
You book a cleaner through an app. Someone shows up at your door. Standard enough. But this time, there is a camera strapped to the worker’s head, pointed outward, recording your home as they move through it — your kitchen shelves, your countertops, your clutter, your life.
That is the image at the centre of a fast-moving privacy controversy involving Pronto, a Bengaluru-based home-services startup that has confirmed it runs a pilot programme where select household jobs are recorded using head-mounted cameras worn by workers. What began as a niche disclosure has exploded into a wide-ranging debate about AI, consent, trust, and what exactly happens to footage shot inside Indian homes.
So What Exactly Is Pronto Doing?
According to a Times of India report, Pronto confirmed that a small subset of customers can opt into a programme where workers wear visible, head-mounted cameras during bookings.
Pronto cofounder and CEO Anjali Sardana told TOI the pilot is designed for customers who feel uneasy about leaving unfamiliar workers alone at home. “They worry about what’s happening in their home during their booking. Something may be stolen or broken, or work may not be done properly,” she said.
Customers who opt in pay an extra Rs 29 per booking. Workers are paid additionally as well. The company says opt-in is not a one-time decision — it must be confirmed before each booking. Sardana told TOI the pilot covers just 0.1% of users, and Pronto has spent months ensuring compliance with India’s Digital Personal Data Protection norms.
So far, so reasonable — a security feature for anxious customers. The controversy, however, is about what happens to the footage after the job is done.
What Triggered The Backlash?
The controversy gained traction after online portal Entrackr reported that an investor memo linked Pronto’s workflows to “physical AI” and robotics training data.
Journalist Harsh Upadhyay amplified it further on X, claiming Pronto professionals were using cameras as part of its investors’ “Physical AI vision” — effectively turning Indian homes into training grounds for AI systems.
Adding fuel to the fire: one of Pronto’s newest investors, Lachy Groom, is also a co-founder of Physical Intelligence, a US startup that builds foundation models for robotics.
Pronto recently raised fresh capital, doubling its valuation to $200 million in just a few months. The timing and the connections were enough to set off alarm bells.
What Does Pronto Say About The Data?
This is where things get complicated. Pronto says videos are anonymised, no audio is recorded, and footage is deleted within 48 hours. But the company confirmed to TOI that “derived datasets” from those recordings are retained — including “key point mapping” data that tracks body joints and hand movements.
When TOI asked whether those datasets could eventually be monetised or shared with third-party AI or robotics firms, Pronto declined to comment.
That silence has done more damage than any direct admission might have. On X, a post declaring “recording inside your house to train AI! This is scary” drew thousands of views. “Trust is the cornerstone of any consumer/service business and Pronto just lost it,” wrote another user.
Why Are People Worried Even If They Haven’t Opted In?
Because anonymisation inside a home is harder than it sounds. As one frequent home-services app user told TOI: “Think name plates, ID cards, credit cards, bills.” A kitchen counter alone can contain enough identifying information to reconstruct who lives there and how.
Behind the broader unease is a rapidly emerging global market for what is called “egocentric,” or first-person, data — footage shot from a human point of view as someone moves through real-world environments. Unlike chatbots trained on text, physical AI systems need exposure to actual kitchens, shelves, utensils, and repetitive human movement to learn how to operate in the world. Some AI labs globally pay between $4 and $10 an hour for such data, according to one founder building in the space, as reported by TOI. Indian homes, it turns out, are valuable territory.
(details to follow)
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