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Meta’s AI smart glasses and data privacy concerns

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Re: Meta’s AI smart glasses and data privacy concerns

#161

Post by ThrowawayR2 »

MerrimanInd wrote: post #17

I was in engineering school back in ~2012 when Google Glass came out. One of my classmates got hold of a pair when they were still quite uncommon and wore them to an extracurricular club meeting. Within minutes someone made a comment about him wearing the "creeper" glasses and asked if he was filming. He never wore them to the club again. I just don't see a world where that doesn't happen with Meta glasses.

Unfortunately, "The French-Italian eyewear brand [EssilorLuxottica] said it sold over 7 million AI glasses last year, up from the 2 million that the company sold in 2023 and 2024 combined." from https://www.cnbc.com/2026/02/11/ray-ban-maker-essilorluxotti... . That's at least 9 million units in the field, probably 1000x more than Google Glass ever sold, and more than 3x growth in sales in one year.

[EDIT] I really shouldn't need to say this on Hacker News but don't shoot the messenger for messages you don't want to hear. Reporting a fact does not imply approval or disapproval of it.

Re: Meta’s AI smart glasses and data privacy concerns

#162

Post by array_key_first »

rbtprograms wrote: post #93
hnuser847 wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nah, I don't see it. They've been trying to make smart glasses a thing for over a decade and it's not working. Nobody wants them. I don't think it's necessarily a privacy thing, it's just that smart glasses don't solve a real problem. Same with VR.

i actually agree with this take; i dont see the problem that smart glasses solve. what, my phone screen isnt literally in front of my eyeballs 24/7? i have a need to be absolutely plugged into scrolling social media and consuming content so much that i just have to have the screen in my glasses? this feels much more like what tech companies want people to want rather than what people want.

Not to mention the input methods just suck major ass. They're extremely slow, error prone, and annoying. Hands are better.

And that's why I don't talk to Siri to drive my car.

Re: Meta’s AI smart glasses and data privacy concerns

#163

Post by robocat »

dataflow wrote: post #99
Aeolun wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Am I so cynical, or does this sound hopelessly naive? This is exactly what I would expect. Certainly of Meta. Amazon had to go out of their way to reassure people that Siri wasn’t always recording. And I’m still not entirely sure I believe that.

The thing is it's not just surprising from a privacy standpoint but also from an engineering standpoint -- this sounds very data-, power-, and storage-intensive, in a device that's very constrained on all sides, so it wouldn't have even occurred to me this was a possibility. When are they even uploading all the videos without blowing through their power budget and internet data limits? Are they heavily compressing it…

> data limits

The data required is small. Each embedding might be 1/2 kB per face.

> power budget

To process a video for biometric feature extraction, it might take 0.5% to 2% of the total power used to record a video. Video uses a lot of power (compression, screen, etc)

Assuming you've got a modern device (e.g. with Apple Neutral Engine). Disclosure: Googled info (Gemini).

Re: Meta’s AI smart glasses and data privacy concerns

#164

Post by array_key_first »

zer0zzz wrote: post #32
MerrimanInd wrote: post #17

I was in engineering school back in ~2012 when Google Glass came out. One of my classmates got hold of a pair when they were still quite uncommon and wore them to an extracurricular club meeting. Within minutes someone made a comment about him wearing the "creeper" glasses and asked if he was filming. He never wore them to the club again. I just don't see a world where that doesn't happen with Meta glasses.

2026 is not 2012

You're right, it's much worse and we should be doing everything we can to turn it around.

I propose we just assume people with meta glasses are recording others in public and we call them creeps. Shaming works, we should use it more.

Re: Meta’s AI smart glasses and data privacy concerns

#166

Post by dormento »

Forgeties79 wrote: post #160
lamontcg wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is Meta claiming in their internal communications that they plan on doing it while people are distracted with other concerns. It isn't really "rhetoric", they're talking like they believe this actually happens, this is strategy. And I tend to agree with them that things like attention and political capital are ultimately finite resources. I've found that the "we can do two things" and "we can walk and chew bubbl…

Damn you’re right. I got so annoyed at the headline I didn’t even read the article so that’s on me

Yeah its more like "quick, its friday night and someone just got bombed, toggle that feature on"

Re: Meta’s AI smart glasses and data privacy concerns

#167

Post by Onavo »

flockonus wrote: post #151
palata wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because you think that "being able to track leadership of a country that knows that other countries may want to target them" does not mean "being able to track pretty much anyone"? Or do you think that those cameras are less secure because the leadership is not good with their people? I'm not sure I follow the criticism here.

Anyone who has a mobile phone has been tracked by their phone provider forever, with the accuracy of a couple blocks. Smartphones only bring more trackers to the equation in the form of apps. What's the material concern to tracking that glasses add?

You can recognize a threat to national security without supporting the ideology behind it. It sounds like you are trying to to spread FUD around stronger privacy regulations. It would be a lot less funny when the shoe is on the other foot and it's not Iranian networks that's being compromised. Are you perhaps a vendor of mass surveillance systems like your username's namesake?

Re: Meta’s AI smart glasses and data privacy concerns

#168

Post by jayd16 »

rbtprograms wrote: post #93
hnuser847 wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nah, I don't see it. They've been trying to make smart glasses a thing for over a decade and it's not working. Nobody wants them. I don't think it's necessarily a privacy thing, it's just that smart glasses don't solve a real problem. Same with VR.

i actually agree with this take; i dont see the problem that smart glasses solve. what, my phone screen isnt literally in front of my eyeballs 24/7? i have a need to be absolutely plugged into scrolling social media and consuming content so much that i just have to have the screen in my glasses? this feels much more like what tech companies want people to want rather than what people want.

You don't want your hands free?

Re: Meta’s AI smart glasses and data privacy concerns

#169

Post by likpok »

gorjusborg wrote: post #91
flir wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's strange to me that that's the line society seems to have drawn in the sand. Body cam, no problem. Doorbell cam, practically universal. Body cam worn on the face? No way. I wonder why.

I'm amazed you can't see the difference. Body cam - used to protect the police and people being policed in a potentially hot conflict. Recording is scoped to these specific interactions that rarely occur for most people. Doorbell cam - highly controversial. See response to dog-finding superbowl ad. Body cam wore on face - Mass surveillance in potentially every conceivable social context. Data owned by Meta, a company…

Eh, doorbell cams aren’t that controversial (ad aside). A lot of people have them already, both from ring (with the concomitant privacy issues) or from other providers (with different but similar issues).

They’re controversial on hacker news but I don’t think people in the “real world” care all that much.

How that connects to the meta glasses is certainly up for debate —- the doorbells provide a lot of value to the user (know who is at the door remotely!), the glasses are more of a mixed bag.

Re: Meta’s AI smart glasses and data privacy concerns

#170

Post by Geonode »

hnuser847 wrote: post #75
Geonode wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a world, because when the displays are high quality and they're thinner and lighter, they're going to replace phones, and almost everyone will be wearing them.

Nah, I don't see it. They've been trying to make smart glasses a thing for over a decade and it's not working. Nobody wants them. I don't think it's necessarily a privacy thing, it's just that smart glasses don't solve a real problem. Same with VR.

Come on, it's obviously a hardware problem. If phones weighed ten pounds I wouldn't carry that around either.

Great glasses would solve a problem, I could take my stupid phone out of my hand.

And glasses will get replaced by contacts, which get replaced with brainwave tech.

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