Controversy over secret public recordings has existed almost as long as video cameras, but a new frontier is now opening due to the growing popularity of smart glasses. According to journalist Joanna Stern’s report on YouTube, the latest front in the war for privacy is taking place in garages and workshops. Stern discovered that masses of people were flocking to aftermarket modders to turn off the recording light on their Meta Ray-Bans to create a “stealth mode.” This light indicates that the smart glasses are recording — perhaps your most private moments, according to a new survey — and that the glasses won’t record if the light is covered, for example by a piece of black tape.
Stern discovered advertisements for this stealth service published in 30 US states. When she hired a modder to turn off the light on her own glasses, he told her that in a single day, “eight or nine” people had contacted him about the service. Whether for seemingly legitimate reasons — Stern spoke to a protester who wanted to record ICE activity without being detected, for example — or for nefarious intentions, turning off the warning light calls into question Meta’s narrative that his glasses are a harmless portal to greater connection with the world around you.
How modders disable the indicator light
In the video, Stern contacts a modder who agrees to allow him and his producer to film the process of deactivating the light on his glasses. He starts by breaking the glass that protects the lamp housing, then pierces the light itself with a Dremel tool. Then, to make sure the lenses appear intact, he pours resin into the case and then cures it under a UV light. The result looks almost indistinguishable from factory-sealed Ray-Ban Metas, especially when viewed from a few feet away.
While mods like this aren’t the only workaround for the recording light, they are one of the hardest to detect (although there are other ways to tell if someone is recording you with smart glasses). Normally, as Stern demonstrates, the glasses will refuse to record if they detect that the recording light is obscured. However, caps designed specifically to obscure light are able to trick the glasses into letting in just enough light to tell the glasses that the indicator is clear. The problem for anyone looking to record secretly is that the capital letters are quite obvious, unlike the mod, which is virtually undetectable.
The Privacy Problem and the Answer
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Smart glasses have been involved in many controversies. Several women have reported being filmed without consent by people wearing Meta Ray-Bans, often only after spotting videos of themselves online. Known as “rizz-camming,” these people use smart glasses to secretly record themselves flirting with others in public, then post the videos online. A woman has become a popular internet hero after she destroyed a man’s Meta Ray-Bans while he was filming her on the subway.
Meta responded to Stern saying it had removed “thousands of listings” for the modding service, but as of this writing, a quick search of Meta’s Facebook Marketplace reveals several active listings for the service. As Stern points out, turning off the indicator light is not currently illegal, but that could change. On June 5, a bill was introduced in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives that would make it illegal to manufacture, sell, or create recordings with smart glasses that lack a working light.
The legality of secret recording is more delicate. Although it is currently legal in most contexts to record people in public places, real-world testing is often complicated by the concept of a “reasonable expectation of privacy.” In some states, this expectation means that the consent of all parties is required to record. However, 38 states (and the District of Columbia) are single-consent states, in which you are allowed to record even private conversations without the other person’s consent.
