Meta’s AI glasses are gaining a growing reputation for their creepy technology. The company hopes to change that opinion by releasing an update that will disable the camera if the LED light that indicates the glasses are recording is tampered with.
The move appears to be a concession to consumer sentiment that glasses are not just a fun, fashionable accessory promoted by Kylie Jenner, but can have serious implications for consumer privacy. Glasses can be abused as a surveillance device.
But even as Meta touts new safeguards this week, the company is also pushing products and features that require users to provide more personal information to the company.
Whether it’s training AI on images, activating AI features using personal content unless you opt in, or exploring ways to continuously record or use biometric facial recognition, Meta’s vision for the future always seems to depend on collecting more personal data.
In a blog post about the new camera safety feature, the company patted itself on the back by noting, “No other type of camera has done this, and we’re proud to be leading the industry.” However, Meta also admits that the move was necessary because some people were using tape to cover their LED lights, which has already forced Meta to apply technology that disables recording when the LEDs are blocked.
Meta’s announcement explains that the same AI glasses creep decided to use “sophisticated efforts to modify or destroy the capture LEDs.”
In other words, Meta is seeing that some people using AI glasses have a hidden agenda: a desire to record situations or people (mainly women) without their consent.
Nonetheless, the company is reportedly testing a prototype of AI glasses that “collect audio continuously while taking pictures every few seconds.” A source recently told the Financial Times.
Meta’s blog post about the glasses feature attempts to soothe people’s fears about privacy on their devices by answering questions like “Who can see the photos and videos I take while wearing my glasses?” Meta responds by promising, “You and only you, unless you choose to share.” However, Meta’s privacy policy explains that any images you share with Meta AI may be used to train the AI.
Meanwhile, the company has faced several investigations and lawsuits over privacy violations in MetaAI Glasses. One lawsuit arose after Meta prominently canceled a contract with an outsourcing technology company after some Kenyan employees claimed they were forced to view graphic content such as sex, nudity, and people using restrooms while training Meta AI using videos of people’s Meta AI glasses.
This isn’t Meta’s first scrap about privacy violations or safety measures either.
Arguably, Meta’s reputation for privacy has been tainted over the years following numerous leaks and losing lawsuits over its lack of child safety measures and desire to grow at all costs. There are books documenting abuses alleged by whistleblowers, not to mention previous large-scale privacy disasters like the Cambridge Analytica data scandal.
Following the Cambridge Analytica scandal in 2018, Meta now claims on its privacy progress updates page that “since 2019, we have been investing significantly in people, products, and technology to continue to advance our rigorous privacy program.”
Despite this, the company continues to push ideas that many people believe violate their privacy. Case in point: On the same day that it announced Meta Glasses’ new safeguards, Meta AI shared that anyone can now use public Instagram photos to create AI images, unless you choose not to.
They’ve also built a feature that uses Meta AI for images in your camera roll that you’ve never shared, and by implementing such poor privacy controls in the Meta AI app, users have essentially made themselves arbitrary by revealing embarrassing searches.
This is the same company that is not affiliated with Apple due to privacy concerns and plans to record employees’ keystrokes to train its AI and sell targeted ads based on data from AI chats.
So while LED protection in AI glasses may be a necessary feature, consumers still have plenty of reasons to be distrustful of how social media uses images and data, especially in its broader AI initiatives.
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