New App Alerts You If Someone Nearby Is Wearing Smart Glasses
- Reference: 0180901856
- News link: https://yro.slashdot.org/story/26/03/03/2343215/new-app-alerts-you-if-someone-nearby-is-wearing-smart-glasses
- Source link:
> Yves Jeanrenaud, who made the app, first spoke to [3]404 Media about the project and said he was in part inspired to make Nearby Glasses after reading the independent publication's reporting into wearable surveillance devices, including how Meta's Ray-Ban smart glasses have been [4]used in immigration raids and to [5]film and harass sex workers .
>
> On the app's project page, Jeanrenaud [6]described smart glasses as an "intolerable intrusion, consent neglecting, horrible piece of tech." Jeanrenaud told TechCrunch in an email that his motivation came from "witnessing the sheer scale and inhumane nature of the abuse these smart glasses are involved in." Jeanrenaud also cited Meta's decision to [7]implement face recognition as a default feature in its smart glasses, "which I consider to be a huge floodgate pushed open for all kinds of privacy-invasive behavior."
>
> The app works by listening for nearby Bluetooth signals that contain a [8]publicly assigned identifier unique to the Bluetooth device's manufacturer. If the app detects a Bluetooth signal from a nearby hardware device made by Meta or Snap, the app will send the user an alert. (The app also allows users to add their own specific Bluetooth identifiers, allowing the user to detect a broader range of wearable surveillance gadgetry.)
Further reading: [9]Meta's AI Display Glasses Reportedly Share Intimate Videos With Human Moderators
[1] https://techcrunch.com/2026/03/02/nearby-glasses-new-app-alerts-you-wearing-smart-glasses-surveillance-meta-snap-bluetooth/
[2] https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=ch.pocketpc.nearbyglasses
[3] https://www.404media.co/this-app-warns-you-if-someone-is-wearing-smart-glasses-nearby/
[4] https://www.404media.co/a-cbp-agent-wore-meta-smart-glasses-to-an-immigration-raid-in-los-angeles/
[5] https://www.404media.co/metas-ray-ban-glasses-users-film-and-harass-massage-parlor-workers/
[6] https://github.com/yjeanrenaud/yj_nearbyglasses
[7] https://tech.slashdot.org/story/26/02/13/1336235/meta-plans-to-let-smart-glasses-identify-people-through-ai-powered-facial-recognition
[8] https://www.bluetooth.com/specifications/assigned-numbers/
[9] https://yro.slashdot.org/story/26/03/03/1926214/metas-ai-display-glasses-reportedly-share-intimate-videos-with-human-moderators
This why we can't have nice things. (Score:2)
So what we are going see now is smart glasses that either don't send their real device class or allow users to configure fake device classes / ids.
This just starts an arms race, and we end up with a bunch stuff that is just fundamentally broken like wifi ssids that are not broadcast and the like. No real security (unless there are no clients) but lots of problems and hassles.
Advertising Product (Score:2)
You have to wonder what Meta's business plan is for products like these. They seem so ill-fitted to their company until you realize it always boils down to an advertising product.
So they want to offer an advertising product that can track everyone's whereabouts in order to sell them more targeted ads?
How do they accomplish this? Install cameras everywhere? Nah, Amazon already did that with Ring, and they don't get into more private spaces. That won't fly. What if we could trick people into buying surveillan
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x-ray glasses...
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These things collect data. That's what they do. And just like everything Google the data feeds their algorhythms.
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People are spending so much time on social media that they are having problems recognizing the faces of people they should know.
Related to this: Sociopaths often attempt to gain the trust of victims by creating an air of familiarity with them. These glasses will help.
Glasshole Alert! (Score:1)
Sounds useful!
And I am making an app (Score:2)
That alerts you when other people have been alerted you are wearing smart glasses! Checkmate!
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And I'm making an app that alerts you when other people who have been alerted that other people have been alerted that someone is wearing smart glasses
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"That alerts you when other people have been alerted you are wearing smart glasses! Checkmate!"
if that alert makes you stop being a glasshole... "Mission Accomplished"
Nudify apps (Score:1)
I fully expect, if somebody hasn't already done it, somebody is going to find a way to work AI into smart glasses such that you'll be able to nudify people on the fly as you're walking around. Cyber Nudism. Somebody is going to take that old speech advice literally, "Just imagine everybody is in their underwear."
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> "Just imagine everybody is in their underwear."
Fooled you! I'm not wearing any.
Nevermind... (Score:2)
...the five cameras in the corners recording everything. Just as long as a pair of Meta glasses aren't recording you.
Re:Nevermind... (Score:4, Insightful)
The five cameras in the corner are very obviously cameras, and not hidden or disguised.
These "smart glasses", on the other hand, or effectively covert cameras, disguised as regular glasses.
They are not the same.
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Are they; do you know if there are or are not hidden cameras in your office building? Are you on a neighbors camera while you open your mailbox?
Cameras are everywhere to point, I think it is a real question as to if the glassholes materially change anything.
I am not making this comment to excuse them, more to point out I expect of people are being record a lot of time without their awareness. Sure maybe it is mostly security footage nobody every looks at, but I wonder how many people realize just how little
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Glassholes should be treated differently, and glassholes should be publicly shamed as ordained by the holiness of your choice.
side note is the app alert notice a repeating "shame on glassholes"?
Re:Nevermind... (Score:4, Insightful)
"Cameras are everywhere to point"
Vast oversimplification for the purpose of your argument. They're not in my house. They're not in the washrooms at work. They are not in a number of other places where people have an expectation of privacy. But if glasses are secret cameras now, that drastically changes the kinds of expectations I can have about those places where I can reasonably expect privacy. There's also a different set of expectations as to the accountability and policies followed by those who have access to security cameras vs literally anybody. The potential for misuse and nefarious intention seems to go higher to me when we go from those who collect security footage and .. literally anybody. That security footage and its collection policies can be abused doesn't mean it's unreasonable to expect it's less likely to be abused than whatever some rando is recording when they head into a washroom or my house or what have you.
If the argument is "well maybe there are secret cameras in all those places" ... I mean, that's just a dumb argument against objecting to the introduction of covert potential recording devices into those places. I can't object to things I don't know about, but I can object to something that I know about.
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> Are they; do you know if there are or are not hidden cameras in your office building? Are you on a neighbors camera while you open your mailbox?
> Cameras are everywhere to point, I think it is a real question as to if the glassholes materially change anything.
> I am not making this comment to excuse them, more to point out I expect of people are being record a lot of time without their awareness. Sure maybe it is mostly security footage nobody every looks at, but I wonder how many people realize just how little privacy they actually have.
For me, the spy nature of the glasses is quite different than the regular security cams. If my neighbor has driveway cams, it is likely more a protective thing. I myself have some security cams I installed a few years back - believe it or not, it was a "fatal attraction" type thing. A friend of my wife became obsessed with me, and after that, my wife was concerned for her safety.
And in a restaurant or bar, security cams also provide a protective service, in case a big kerfuffal breaks out. But they don
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> The five cameras in the corner are very obviously cameras, and not hidden or disguised.
> These "smart glasses", on the other hand, or effectively covert cameras, disguised as regular glasses.
> They are not the same.
Nevermind that those covert cameras are also designed to harvest data on everything and perform things like facial recognition as well as likely getting location and orientation information.
Flock cameras are being vandalized and all they do is take photos of people's license plates as they pass by. T
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They aren't always recording though. The battery would last 5 minutes if they were.
They also have an LED so you know if they are recording. Okay, you can disable it, but phones typically have no indication that they are recording, and there are plenty of much better covert ways to do that. Amazon is full of wearable, discrete cameras.
This guy is far too late with his app.
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"A sixth camera is one too many!"
This is what happens when the government lets people pick which hand gets the sex-monitoring chip. In hindsight, we shouldn't have left it to them.
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> "A sixth camera is one too many!"
> This is what happens when the government lets people pick which hand gets the sex-monitoring chip. In hindsight, we shouldn't have left it to them.
Correct, it is only acceptable to put it in the right! The left is unacceptable!
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I can think of private premises where there are no cameras installed on the walls, like gyms, spas etc. and where they forbid the use of recording devices.
There used to be signs up forbidding any device with a camera being brought in but I rarely see those signs now, or they have been modified to forbid using the devices but not carrying them. There are so many devices with cameras nowadays that, so long as they are not used and they stay in a pocket or in the locker it's not a problem. Also phones etc. hav
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I've seen cameras installed in gyms to monitor the exercise floor. There's no reason they wouldn't be, and multiple reasons to have them, including showing customers misusing equipment, harassing other customers, or starting fights. They're not installed in the locker rooms, but the main floor is perfectly fine.
They're also perfectly within their rights to ban customer recording devices, including smart glasses.
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> I can't think of any legitimate use for the "smart" glasses
I'm not saying you're wrong overall but I've heard of blind people using them to help navigate the world.
Squirrel! (Score:3)
Pretending a glasshole scanning you for Zuckerbook and the lulz is the same as random surveillance cameras is a low-rent distraction.
"Why are you so upset that cops follow you everywhere you go? Lots of other cars are behind you too."