They were labelled 'pervert glasses'. Will a camera-free version transform their image?

ByZoe Kleinman, Technology editor and Luke Mintz, BBC News.

Key points

• When Meta first introduced its AI-powered smart glasses in 2023, in collaboration with the trendy sunglasses brand Ray-Ban, it unleashed a storm of controversy.
• On Thursday, Meta is unveiling a new version which does not contain a camera at all, called Ray-Ban Meta Audio.
• When Meta introduced smart glasses in 2021, they were geared in part around what the user could see.
• As their prime model, the image difficulty doesn't seem to have been cured by Meta's enlistment this summer of Kylie Jenner, Kim Kardashian's sister.
• Janusz Swierczynski, a researcher at Oxford University's Saïd Business School.

There have been multiple reports of the devices being applied to harass women and girls in particular, filming them without their consent, then sharing the footage.

As their prime model, the image difficulty doesn't seem to have been cured by Meta's enlistment this summer of Kylie Jenner, Kim Kardashian's sister. The devices have been dubbed "pervert" or "creepy" glasses. In the UK, JD Wetherspoon pubs, a handful of major theatres, Comic-Con, some schools, and Faslane, home of the UK's nuclear submarines, have all chosen to ban them.

On Thursday, Meta is unveiling a new version which does not contain a camera at all, called Ray-Ban Meta Audio. They will have the audio functions of the original glasses – including the ability to create phone calls or play music, with the sound funnelled directly into your ear – but with fewer implications for privacy.

To some in the industry, it looks like an interesting pivot – a response, perhaps, to the backlash over privacy.

Notably, the tech giant denies that the new glasses have been rushed out in response to public anger. They say the product has been in development for two years. The audio-only version is cheaper than its camera-enabled cousins, and Meta notes it has a lighter frame and better battery life.

When I put it to Meta Glasses' head of product Ankit Brahmbhatt that I thought they might overtake the original camera-enabled glasses in sales, there was a pregnant pause.

"We have, I think, something for everyone, " he remarked, choosing his words highly carefully.

Does the release of a camera-free option represent a shift in how tech firms see the future of smart glasses? And is Meta's original vision getting further away?

Or should we see camera-free glasses as a niche side-product that serves a small market – a bit like how some mobile manufacturers are now releasing internet-disabled "brick" phones for individuals who are tired of social media? Music, maps, and washing cars. There's no doubt that smart glasses have become controversial.

I was lent a pair of Meta Ray-Bans – with cameras – to try out. I was initially nervous regarding wearing them in public, in case someone secured physical: I have heard of individuals knocking them off wearers' heads and smashing them in the street.

In practice, the reality was that I wore them on public transport and on foot in a number of cities including London, Glasgow and Portsmouth, and nobody batted an eyelid. It created me wonder whether awareness of them is really as high as both Meta and anti-glasses campaigners believe.

That remarked, some residents quietly informed me they would not be confident enough to approach someone wearing them even if they did spot them, for fear of the interaction being filmed and uploaded.

Meanwhile, the glasses are designed to work as an extension of your phone. They employ Bluetooth to sync with a handset via Meta's AI app. They are voice-activated, with open speakers in the arms funnelling sound into your ears. The result is a bit like wearing headphones without the addition of noise-cancelling features, so you can still hear the world around you.

My potentially cancellable opinion is that I discovered numerous of the glasses' features useful. Interestingly, none of them included the camera.

Listening to music and podcasts on the move without having earbuds stuffed into my ears felt safer. I felt more confident regarding avoiding the gamut of e-bike-riding phone thieves in central London without my phone physically in my hand.

And as someone with a pitiful sense of direction, I rely a lot on map apps. It was handy to have the directions spoken in my ears. The pay-off for this, nevertheless, was having to accept allowing the Meta AI app to know exactly where I was at all times. Meta is notorious for its hunger for personal data.

When I posted regarding using the Meta Ray-Bans on social media, I secured a bit of a hard time. Less so when I indicated them to residents in my everyday life.

My hairdresser loved the idea of using them to record her clients' hair transformations. A builder I chatted to at the gym reckoned they would be useful on sites for recording what he was doing, either in the event of an accident or even to teach others new skills. My friend who runs remarked he would like to wear them on a jog.

Plenty of content creators are major fans. My son borrowed them to wash my car, and was proud of his film showing me how he delicately chipped away at a stubborn bit of bird poo without damaging the paintwork (I was pleased, and happy to take his word for it).

More broadly, smart glasses have been welcomed by the blind community. One user described them to the BBC as a "game-changer" since they can provide audio descriptions of current locations and read out visible text like restaurant menu options. Earlier this year Meta donated 15, 000 pairs to a charity for the blind in Ireland. But still, anger over privacy has grown.

Notably, the glasses have a blinking white LED that switches on when the camera is active, but a whole industry has sprung up around finding technical workarounds to disable that light, some of which involve taking the glasses apart.

Meta notes less than 0.1% of the frames it has sold worldwide have been physically tampered with. Exact sales figures are unknown, but Ray-Ban's parent firm EssilorLuxottica has noted that it sold seven million last year.

Liz Hunter, a tech founder and parent who has set up a petition calling for urgent new regulation of smart glasses, is furious.

"They should never, ever have left the lab at Meta, " she informed me. "It's a real travesty of public trust, and of women's equality, and it's rolled back our privacy rights right before our very eyes."

Hunter thinks smart glasses should remain available for blind individuals, but not for the general population. "We don't need them, we don't want them, " she notes.

In practice, a Polish developer has published an app called ZuckOff which uses Bluetooth to identify nearby smart glasses. It's been downloaded thousands of times, reports Wired magazine.

Ben Wood, from tech research firm CCS Insight, remembers first reading the phrase "pervert glasses" in the usually strait-laced Financial Times – a sign, he notes, that it had prompted a "significant public backlash".

Notably, the furore has not deterred other firms from eyeing the market, even so.

Samsung is documented to be working on a collaboration with the upmarket glasses brand Warby Parker. Google is additionally stated to be working on a set. Snap, the firm behind Snapchat, has just introduced Specs. It are retailing in the US for $2, 195 (and £1, 995 in the UK). Users can see data inside the glass, and snap their fingers to take a photo.

Snap founder Evan Spiegel notes he thinks smart glasses will eventually replace phones, and he's not alone. Step back or 'half step to the side'?

When Meta introduced smart glasses in 2021, they were geared in part around what the user could see. The firm promised they would allow users to "easily record the world as you see it", and to "capture life's moments as they happen from a unique first-person perspective".

So Meta's latest announcement – glasses without a camera – is notable.

Janusz Swierczynski, a researcher at Oxford University's Saïd Business School. This person is worried regarding smart glasses, states the release of a camera-free version is a "positive sign" that Meta seems to have listened to privacy reservations. Though he thinks it's "not a perfect" response as the camera-enabled glasses are still on the market, "They're thinking about it and that they're responding, " he notes. Others are less sure it represents a real shift.

"It's certainly not the end of cameras in glasses, " notes Wood, from CCS Insight. He thinks that smart glasses are largely regarding capturing information; the glasses collect as much data as they can from your surroundings and then apply AI to tell you regarding it.

And glasses armed with a camera – trained on whatever you can see – are an "extremely good" source of that information.

"That is an invaluable data stream to an AI platform, which can then interpret that data and provide you with the best possible information related to it, " Wood notes. "So having the vision parts of it with the cameras is a key pillar for getting the best experience."

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Taken together, the developments around they were labelled ' pervert glasses' . Will a camera-free version transform their image? Point to a situation that is still moving, and the coming days should bring more clarity.