Meta Fixes Smart Glasses Loophole That Allowed Recording With LED Covered

Meta is fixing a loophole that allowed users of its AI-powered smart glasses to continue recording even after covering the front-facing LED.

Users cannot start recording a video or take a picture if they cover the front-facing LED, which blinks to alert others that the person wearing the smart glasses is recording. However, some users discovered that they could continue recording if they covered the LED after starting the recording.

“We have an update coming to increase the reliability of the capture LED on our AI glasses. The camera won’t start recording if the LED is blocked, but some people try to bypass this by starting a recording and then covering it up. A fix for this is starting to roll out — the camera will now stop working if the light is covered during a recording,” said Alex Himel, Meta’s vice president of augmented reality, in a post on Threads.

“We’re going to keep rolling out updates like this to make sure the capture LED can reliably alert bystanders when photos or videos are being captured for someone’s gallery. Only a tiny minority of people try to get around these protections, and the fact that they have to go to these lengths shows our efforts are working. We’ll keep improving and evolving our approach,” Himel further said.

The update comes a month after Meta enabled the smart glasses to shut down when users tamper with the capture light.

Smart glasses have sparked concerns regarding privacy. Recently, a German advocacy group filed a criminal complaint against Meta and other companies selling AI glasses in the country, arguing that the devices violate privacy laws.

Cinema operators in the UK are introducing policies to prohibit or restrict camera-enabled smart glasses, including Meta’s AI-powered glasses, citing privacy and film piracy concerns.

Courts in England and Wales have also prohibited the use of Meta’s smart glasses because of restrictions on taking images and videos inside courts.