Meta reportedly tucked facial-recognition code into the app for its camera glasses, then got very upset when journalists treated that like something the public might want to know.
While not yet active or available to consumers, Wired reports that Meta has installed facial recognition software that plugs into a client-side database housed in Meta's O&O app, matching people to their faces. Certainly, that could not be abused.
The report made clear that NameTag isn't activated yet, nor is it accessible to consumers in its current form. But the prospect of consumer-facing smart glasses equipped with facial recognition tech has long had privacy advocates on edge — and with public adoption of Meta's smart glasses on the rise, privacy concerns have become more pertinent than ever. If a company has gone about building out the infrastructure to roll out a wildly controversial feature of this kind, consumers might want to know about that, even if the feature currently remains inaccessible.
And yet, according to the company's executives, it's "dishonest" to inform the public about a piece of unreleased tech that Meta has chosen to incorporate into a consumer product.
In its initial response to Wired, Meta referred to the discovery as "sensational" and characterized NameTag as exploratory. "We've said before we're exploring these types of features, and what you're seeing is just evidence of that exploration," the company said in a statement to Wired. "Nothing has shipped to consumers and no final decision has been made on what to do here, if anything. If we do decide to roll something out, we will take a thoughtful approach and do so with full transparency. One decision we can be clear about—we are not building a central face database."
Futurism
The kraken is unreleased because it is still in development.
Previously:
• When Meta, Google, and Apple agree on 'privacy,' watch your wallet
• Meta backs off tracking workers' keystrokes after they revolt
• Meta fined 91m euros for storing passwords in plaintext
