Pretty sure this was described exactly in Snow Crash (Neal Stephenson, 1992).
People lost their shit about Google Glass, claiming users would be able to take pics of them without their knowledge, yet they didn’t bat an eye at the established creepers doing that already with smartphones and they sure don’t seem to care much about Meta putting forth Glass 2.0, now with more invasiveness! An article about it is a good first step, but articles like this about Glass were everywhere, along with a general negative sentiment in the public (and there even were some assaults on people using those things!), yet I rarely hear about these even worse glasses. Do people just not care about privacy anymore?
I think the problem lies in the underestimation of the potential for that level of personal data. The privacy counter-argument is usually “nothing to hide.” Psychographic profiling is the incredibly accurate practice of predicting an individual’s engagement based on previous choices, and is far more invasive than “telling secrets.”
Google Glass was way back in like 2013, 10 years later people just expect to have cameras everywhere in public since nearly everyone now has a good camera in their pocket that they’re also using to actually take pics and videos all the time of food, places, buildings, scenery, selfies etc.
Each one of us is probably in the background of who knows many peoples pictures by now
Do people just not care about privacy anymore?
Correct. Older people still do, but it’s 20 years later now and there are two generations of people who have never had privacy at any point of their lives. So they don’t understand what has been taken from them, and openly declare that they don’t care.
Personally, I also hadn’t even heard of these until now. Maybe they’re just not being marketed to the tech enthusiast crowd as we’re the sorta people who’d diss it for the privacy implication?
yet they didn’t bat an eye at the established creepers doing that already with smartphones
I don’t think anyone’s happy about that either, but the problem with Google Glass (and now even worse with the Facebook ones) is that they’re pretty damn subtle. You notice someone taking out their phone to take a photo of you, but just looking towards you with sunglasses on? Welllllll yeah.
What’s driving me nuts is that people will focus on the glasses.
Yes, the glasses ARE a problem because Meta, despite being warned by experts like AccessNow to SHOW when a camera is recording, you know with a bright red LED as it’s been the case with others devices before, kept it “stealthy” because it’s… cool I guess?
Anyway, the glasses themselves are but the tip of the iceberg. They are the end of the surveillance apparatus that people WILLINGLY decide to contribute to. What do I mean? Well that people who are “shocked” by this kind of demonstrations (because that’s what it is, not actual revelations) will be whining about it on Thread or X after sending a WhatsApp message to their friends and sending GMail to someone else on their Google, I mean Android, phone and testing the latest version of ChatGPT. Maybe the worst part in all this? They paid to get a Google Nest inside their home and an Amazon Ring video doorbell outside. They ARE part of the surveillance.
Those people are FUELING surveillance capitalism by pouring their private data to large corporations earning money on their usage.
Come on… be shocked yes, be horrified yes, but don’t pretend that you are not part of the problem. You ARE wearing those “glasses” in other form daily, you are paying for it with money and usage. Stop and buy actual products, software and hardware, from companies who do not make money with ads, directly or indirectly. Make sure the products you use do NOT rely on “the cloud” and siphon all your data elsewhere, for profit. Change today.
Several states have anti-spying laws that require disclosure that you’re recording them. I expect we’ll see an uptick in lawsuits about this issue, which will force Meta to revise their device or will cause a chilling effect on their sales.
Source on that? Last I checked it was nationwide that there was no expectation to privacy in public places
https://www.dmlp.org/legal-guide/recording-phone-calls-and-conversations
The info on that page is a little dated but mostly accurate (there’s still 11 states that require two-party consent for recording a conversation, for example). There’s other sources you can find.
I’m not saying it’s a slam dunk case against devices like this, but it’s not like it’s especially common for people to walk around with what are essentially covert cameras on their faces. It’s something for future courts to decide, and I could see an argument against them on these grounds.
Again, I’m NAL.
I recently had to explain to my boomer mom why a Ring doorbell was a bad idea. She didn’t seem to get that the system is cheap because it’s constantly feeding whatever it sees to both Ring and your local cops.
Yeah but like everything in life, it’s a trade off. Most people cannot maintain their own home surveillance system without the help of a company like Amazon or Google. These people have to decide between no security cameras or security cameras with caveats. I don’t think it’s fair to criticize people who choose the latter. The unfortunate truth is maintaining a security system that works well is very difficult, time consuming and can be unreliable. Even most of the tech savvy people I know just end up paying a company like Amazon to do it.
Huh. Who saw this coming besides literally everyone?
The sad thing is, facial recognition glasses would be really useful to people like me with prosopagnosia (face blindness), but I would only want them if the processing is done locally on device.
As with most bleeding edge technology, all the danger comes from capitalism, and not the technology itself.
