A guerrilla campaign in London has drawn attention to privacy concerns surrounding Meta’s AI-powered smart glasses through provocative spoof advertisements. The activist group Everyone Hates Elon installed posters at bus stops across the city, including near Meta’s headquarters in King’s Cross, depicting figures such as the convicted paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein wearing the glasses.
One advertisement installed on Carnegie Street displayed an image of Epstein alongside the tagline: “Glasses for people who don’t do consent.” Another poster, designed as an optical illusion, featured a celebrity wearing the glasses; as pedestrians approach, the celebrity’s face transforms into a skull and the text changes from “Meta AI glasses” to “Meta: We’re always watching.” The campaign aims to highlight fears that the glasses could facilitate covert recording, particularly targeting vulnerable groups.
Jane, a spokesperson for Everyone Hates Elon, argued that the glasses pose significant risks to privacy, especially for women and children. She warned that future iterations of the device might eliminate the indicator light that signals when recording is in progress, making it easier to capture images or videos without consent. “These glasses feel like they’re making perverts’ and abusers’ lives easier when we should actually be making women’s lives easier,” she said.
The Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses, priced between £247 and £459, feature a 12-megapixel ultra-wide camera capable of capturing high-resolution photos and 3K video, alongside discreet microphones and open-ear audio. Users can stream content directly to Instagram and Facebook. Reports have indicated that some individuals in London have been filmed without their knowledge, with some footage subsequently shared on social media platforms.
The protest coincides with reports that Meta is developing a prototype for “super-sensing” AI glasses. According to industry sources, these advanced devices would constantly record audio and video of the wearer’s surroundings, allowing an AI assistant to recall the user’s daily activities and answer queries about things they have seen. There are claims that the recording indicator light, currently mandatory on existing models, may be disabled when these enhanced features are activated, raising further privacy concerns.
Meta responded by stating that privacy protections have been integrated into the glasses from the outset. A bright white LED light on the frame signals whenever a photo or video is captured, and the light cannot be turned off. “Both people wearing the glasses and those around them feel comfortable,” the company said. Instagram head Adam Mosseri added that the glasses are designed to cease functioning if the LED light is tampered with and that content involving harassment or exploitation would be removed from the platform.
The campaign by Everyone Hates Elon follows previous stunts targeting high-profile figures, including Elon Musk and members of the British royal family, as part of the group’s broader efforts to call attention to issues of consent and power abuses. In response to the current spoof posters, Leonardo Maria Del Vecchio, president and chief strategy officer at Ray-Ban’s parent company EssilorLuxottica, shared one of the images on Instagram with a humorous caption, acknowledging the criticism while underscoring the seriousness of the concerns raised. EssilorLuxottica was contacted for further comment.