{"id":616631,"date":"2026-08-02T12:35:15","date_gmt":"2026-08-02T12:35:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/616631\/"},"modified":"2026-08-02T12:35:15","modified_gmt":"2026-08-02T12:35:15","slug":"is-it-possible-to-make-smart-glasses-that-arent-creepy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/616631\/","title":{"rendered":"Is It Possible to Make Smart Glasses That Aren\u2019t Creepy?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Face computers are on the upswing, as companies, massive and tiny, are all vying for nuggets in the smart-glasses<\/a> gold rush.<\/p>\n

That also means the industry is garnering its fair share of criticism, mostly focusing on the fact that creeps<\/a> can abuse camera-equipped smart glasses to capture photos and videos of people without their knowledge or consent.<\/p>\n

The prime target for such criticism is the biggest company in the space, Meta<\/a>. The company\u2019s smart glasses can capture images, audio, and video of whatever and whoever the wearer is looking at. That alone is enough to alarm anyone concerned about protecting their privacy. Meta\u2019s smart glasses do have an indicator light to warn bystanders when they\u2019re being recorded, though some Meta users have figured out how to bypass those safety features and disable the lights<\/a>. More recently, the company has added anti-tamper features that disable the glasses if a user has meddled with them.<\/p>\n

Other concerns about the glasses have continued to mount. Earlier this year, Meta programmed a feature that, if enabled, would add face-recognition technology<\/a> to its smart glasses. After a WIRED report exposed this feature, Meta then deleted the code<\/a> from its app. Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth verified the existence of the feature<\/a>, called Name Tag, on The Atlantic\u2019s podcast The Most Interesting Thing in AI<\/a>.<\/p>\n

(At an event in June, Meta also said it’s considering<\/a> adding camera-free smart glasses to its lineup.)<\/p>\n

This conversation around privacy and smart glasses is only going to grow as other big tech companies\u2014notably Google and Samsung<\/a>\u2014enter the space later this year. Apple is also reportedly working on smart glasses<\/a> that could arrive in 2027, though it has reportedly delayed production<\/a> to address the privacy issues.<\/p>\n

As invasive as the technology can feel, lots of people really do want and like their smart glasses. Meta has sold tens of millions<\/a> of units, and despite impassioned debates about privacy among tech watchdogs and the general public, the company\u2019s glasses are selling better than ever<\/a>.<\/p>\n

People have found genuinely useful reasons<\/a> to wear the glasses, whether it\u2019s quickly snapping a picture or a GoPro-style<\/a> video of a sick mountain bike run. There are also accessibility use cases that artificial intelligence can help with, like real-time captioning of spoken conversations and Meta\u2019s partnership with Be My Eyes<\/a>, which helps visually impaired people interact with the world around them by activating the glasses\u2019 camera.<\/p>\n

Smaller brands have tried to appeal to the anti-Meta crowd with privacy-focused smart glasses. Even Realities, for example, makes smart glasses<\/a> without cameras in a deliberate attempt to differentiate<\/a> from Meta\u2019s offerings. Other glasses, like the new Solos frames, come with a privacy shield<\/a> users can pop over the camera lenses in sensitive environments.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe fact that it’s even a discussion point is really great for the industry,\u201d says Matt Margolis, vice president of business development at Vuzix<\/a>, an enterprise optics manufacturer. \u201cIf it didn’t matter, it wouldn’t be a point of focus, which means we’re really close to having critical mass of products into the market.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Detail<\/p>\n

Be seeing you!<\/p>\n

Photograph: Julian Chokkattu\/WIRED<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Face computers are on the upswing, as companies, massive and tiny, are all vying for nuggets in the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":616632,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[261],"tags":[291,289,290,18,282,823,19,17,1722,824,1470,5220,82,3149],"class_list":["post-616631","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-eire","tag-gadgets","tag-google","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-meta","tag-privacy","tag-samsung","tag-smart-glasses","tag-technology","tag-wearables"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/117025946778453481","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/616631","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=616631"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/616631\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/616632"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=616631"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=616631"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=616631"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}