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  • Hacker News
  • They lost badly to X a few years back, only to show incredible maturity and grace by quitting the platform afterward .. would love to see how they do against Meta
    by gyanchawdhary
  • I suppose these devices might be a helping hand to folks who are visually impaired.

    As if it's not enough to run a global surveillance platform, they now have released the world a army of live, lobotomised surveillance drones. My take is that the only legislation we need is this: give legal immunity to the people who want to grab the glasses off the smug faces of the said drones, and smash it into pieces.

    by penguin_booze
  • Wonder how long until something like this comes to the United States? Doubt it'll happen federally but could see some states like California setting up similar cases
    by Bleaphar
  • Zuckerburg suckt Trumps dick.

    Trump doesn't care.

    I don't think this will be banned in the USA

    by Manfrednotfunny
  • "HateAid said its complaint was based on a federal digital data protection law that prohibits the sale of communication devices designed to film people without them noticing."

    I think the light makes it pretty clear it's recording? There will always be devices made to suppress this... I'm not sure I want to go down the path of mandating an audible camera click sound like they have for smartphones in Japan

    by peter_stokes
  • What would be best for a video equivalent of that? I can imagine an old school "film rolling" sound playing for as long as it's recording, or some tape hiss or something.
    by nemomarx
  • There's news articles already about women realising they were recorded without their consent and are now on TikTok or something. Just waiting for the first lawsuit against Meta about that, hopefully it kills the idea.
    by red_admiral
  • Ah, I was waiting for this to happen! That will be interesting to follow. From my non-lawyer read of German laws that should be a n easy win for the advocacy group, but I’m interested to see Meta’s arguments
    by dgellow
  • I think they will argue that the led gives an indication that it's recording and therefore not "hidden in everyday object". The issue is more about people removing the LED, I guess they will toughen the law about this in the future.
    by elias_t
  • The relevant legal provision is from §8 TDDDG [1]:

    "(1) It is prohibited to possess, manufacture, make available on the market, import, or otherwise bring within the territory to which this Act applies, telecommunications equipment that, by its appearance, purports to be another object or is disguised as an object of everyday use and that, because of these circumstances or because of the way it functions, is particularly suited and intended to intercept, without that person’s knowledge, the non-publicly spoken words of another person or to record images of another person without that person’s knowledge."

    IANAL, but this sounds like it's directly applicable.

    Violations can be punished with up to two years in prison or a fine.

    [1] https://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/ttdsg/__8.html

    by rbehrends
  • Glasses that record video have been around for decades, they just weren't as pervasive. It sounds like this is a general law against disguised surveillance cameras, which I'm sure has historically included camera glasses, so it seems like kind of a slam dunk unless Meta can somehow argue that smart glasses have become common enough to be readily recognized as a recording device.
    by closetohome
  • The main complaint and law that HateAid, the organization that lodged the complaint, is using, is that recording devices have to be visible as such. Glasses are not a known and widely accepted video/photo device and therefore affected by that law.

    Effectively, their complaint is that a specific model looks too much like normal sunglasses that other people are unable to distinguish them as such.

    Article with a bit more detail:

    https://www.heise.de/en/news/AI-glasses-Criminal-charges-aga...

    by mschild
  • Heads should be rolling at Ray-Ban, they've permanently tarnished an iconic American brand by aligning themselves with big tech.
    by squidsoup
  • I imagine Meta and folks wearing these glasses would object to webcam like behavior where it tells you with a LED that it's consuming the video feed. Could be same for taking a picture.

    But then probably fewer people would buy them.

    by barbazoo