Meta’s AI glasses are reportedly sending sensitive footage to human reviewers in Kenya

Meta’s AI-powered smart glasses could send sensitive footage to human reviewers in Nairobi, Kenya, according to an investigation by Swedish outlets Swedish daily and Gutenberg Post. report, Which was published last weekMeta contractors in Kenya claim to have seen videos taken with smart glasses that show “bathroom visits, sex and other intimate moments.”

So far, at least one Proposed class action lawsuit Meta’s accusation of violating false advertising and privacy laws emerged in response Swedish dailyReports citing the company’s claim that its smart glasses are designed for privacy:

By affirmatively claiming that the glasses are designed to protect privacy, Meta assumed a duty to disclose material facts that would inform a reasonable consumer’s decision to purchase the product. Instead, Meta hid a troubling truth: that using AI features results in a stranger halfway around the world watching the most private moments of a person’s life.

Nairobi-based contractors interviewed by Swedish daily They are AI annotationswhich means they label images, text, or audio, with the goal of helping AI systems understand the data they are training on. “We see everything, from living rooms to naked bodies,” says one worker. Swedish daily. “Meta has this type of content in its databases.”

A former Meta employee reportedly says Swedish daily Faces in annotation data are automatically hidden, although staff in Kenya say this “does not always work as intended”, and some faces are still visible. Another person reportedly told the outlet that wearers’ bank cards sometimes appear in the footage they review as well.

Meta’s Ray-Ban and Oakley smart glasses come with a built-in AI assistant that is able to answer questions about what the user can see. The popularity of eyeglasses has risen in recent years, despite their growth Concerns about privacy and surveillance.

EssilorLuxottica, the eyewear giant that Meta is working with to develop camera-equipped glasses, will sell more than 7 million AI-powered glasses in 2025. More than three times its sales In 2023 and 2024 combined. Last year, Meta made some changes to Its privacy policy Which keeps Meta AI enabled with the use of the camera on your glasses “unless you turn off “Hey Meta.” It also stopped allowing wearers to opt out of having their audio recordings stored in the cloud.

As reported Swedish dailyour Kenya-based AI reviewers work with transcription as well, ensuring that Meta AI provides the right answer to the questions users ask out loud. In a statement to EdgeMedia captured by its smart glasses “stays on the user’s device” unless they choose to share it with other people or Meta, says Meta spokeswoman Tracy Clayton.

“When people share content using Meta AI, we sometimes have contractors review that data to improve people’s experience, as many other companies do,” Clayton says. “We take steps to filter this data to protect people’s privacy and to help prevent review of personally identifiable information.”