Meta's Ray-Ban smart glasses are selling faster than almost any consumer electronics product in history — seven million pairs and counting. But the technology is generating serious controversy, and it's not hard to see why.
Women at beaches, shops, and on the street are being secretly filmed by men wearing the glasses, often as part of videos posted online without the women's knowledge or consent. Because photography in public is broadly legal, victims have little legal recourse. One woman told the BBC that when she asked for a secret recording of her to be removed, she was told that doing so was "a paid service."
The privacy concerns don't stop there. Workers in Kenya hired to watch videos recorded through Meta's glasses — to create AI training data — reported being required to view graphic content. Glass wearers then filed lawsuits, with some saying they had no idea such recordings had been made at all. Meta maintains that users were informed of the possibility of human review in its terms of service, yet the backlash has done little to slow sales. The company's chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, boasted that the glasses are "some of the fastest-growing consumer electronics in history."
Google, too, is set to try again with smart glasses, more than a decade after its notorious Google Glass flop, which the company pulled from the public within two years of launch as the pricey gadget came under fire over privacy concerns. Apple and Snap are also preparing their own versions. Should AI or smart glasses products from more companies end up selling as well as Meta's version, researchers expect as many as 100 million people will buy a pair in the next few years.
That prospect alarms privacy lawyers. David Kessler, who heads the US privacy practice at Norton Rose Fulbright, says his corporate clients are already having to grapple with the issue. And the stakes could rise further: Meta reportedly plans to add facial recognition to a future version, meaning wearers could not only surreptitiously record strangers but instantly identify them too.
