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submitted 22 hours ago by velma@sh.itjust.works to c/privacy@lemmy.ml

They met at a bar in midtown Manhattan. He arrived wearing a baseball cap pulled low and sported a pair of black-framed glasses, she says. As conversation flowed, from discussions about navigating life in New York to past relationships, he mentioned that his glasses were Meta Ray-Bans.

“I wasn’t familiar with them,” McAnuff, a 28-year-old project manager who now lives in Toronto, tells WIRED. It was her first time seeing the smart glasses up close, which can record images and video from the wearer’s viewpoint. He let her try them on and even showed her a couple of videos that he’d taken previously, she says. “That was it. We stopped talking about it after that. I figured that was the end of the use.”

The next day, checking her Instagram, McAnuff noticed she’d been tagged in one of his story posts. To her surprise, it was footage of them at the bar and on the subway together, en route to a basketball game uptown. In the video, McAnuff is captured from an above angle, sitting across from her date who is holding a drinking glass; WIRED has seen screenshots of the footage. “I felt super violated,” McAnuff says. “Like, what if I don’t want everyone knowing what I’m up to? He felt so free to film me and post it. There was no conversation about it.”

Meta sold more than 7 million pairs of the Ray-Bans in 2025, as its smart glasses have infiltrated public spaces thanks to pranksters with dreams of viral fame, some of whom even film people while they’re at work. The phenomenon, which has also spread to pickup artists hitting on women, has earned the hardware the nickname “creep glasses.”

Among singles, and particularly women, Meta’s AI-powered eyewear has become a recurring nuisance, as people share a spreading unease about being covertly filmed on dates.

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[-] ScoffingLizard@lemmy.dbzer0.com 13 points 7 hours ago

Anyone wearing these anywhere is a huge red flag.

[-] Zensate@lemmy.world 9 points 8 hours ago

Oh, how fun. Now we'll all be even more repressed because literally every interaction will be recorded and you better not do anything cringe.

[-] rekabis@lemmy.ca 16 points 10 hours ago* (last edited 10 hours ago)

Pervert glasses.

They’re called pervert glasses.

Get it right, Wired.

And let’s also lay it all out: the only people wearing them are sick enough in the head to need immediate institutionalization. Full stop, end of story.

[-] renrenPDX@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 7 hours ago

I still like the original Glass Hole.

7 million? People actually bought this?

Jeez there's a lot of perverts in the world

[-] FatVegan@leminal.space 3 points 5 hours ago

Last week i walked by a store that rented them out.

[-] uriel238@lemmy.blahaj.zone 12 points 11 hours ago

My Meta Glasses memeable thought of the day:

If you feel violated when a private citizen follows you around with a camera, might want to also feel violated when the state follows you around with millions of cameras.

[-] heartSagan5@lemmy.zip 8 points 10 hours ago* (last edited 10 hours ago)

Right. Flock, et al. are a violation of our 4th Amendment rights. These autonomous deputies are annotating our movements and our private vehicles.

[-] mangobanana@discuss.online 7 points 11 hours ago

I'm old enough to remember when Google came out with their version. People went appoleptic and cried invasion of privacy. What happened, why were these not shunned in the same way? It's our because they just look like sun glasses? The only acceptable use for these is to aide blind people

[-] Sanctus@anarchist.nexus 8 points 12 hours ago

Velma Idk what it is about your post but they seem to make the misogynists crawl out of the network. Always multiple people telling on themselves in the comments. Not every post with "Men" in the title needs someone saying "b-but women!"

[-] Zarobi@aussie.zone 5 points 11 hours ago

I think some people have decided Velma's username is "the place to settle the gender wars". They make a lot of posts and are pretty famous. I wouldn't be surprised if they have stalkers who follow every post, or at least the same people repeating the same opinions in different flavours. Usually some variation of "gender problems don't exist" denial.

[-] Ice@lemmy.zip 118 points 21 hours ago

~~Men~~ Wearing Meta Glasses ~~on Dates~~ Is an Instant Red Flag

[-] huppakee@lemmy.world 6 points 11 hours ago

I've read this story about it where the people who bought them stopped wearing them within a few weeks because they felt uncomfortable wearing them - common theme was, when people notice you were those glasses they shun you and find an excuse to end the conversation. Guess people in general agree with you.

[-] reptar@lemmy.world 7 points 15 hours ago

That was my first though, yeah ...

On dates does add to it though

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[-] IpsumLauren@lemmy.world 62 points 20 hours ago

I thought the convention was to call them "perv glasses"?

[-] unitedwithme@lemmy.today 20 points 19 hours ago
[-] Hueristic_Autistic@lemmy.world 4 points 12 hours ago* (last edited 12 hours ago)

I wonder what's gonna happen when someone who has like a reactionary-style mental illness, yet is cognitively aware enough to know what the glasses are and keeps up with current events, sees someone with the glasses on and just punches the person in the face. 🤣.

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[-] Idontwanttowork@lemmy.world 2 points 10 hours ago

I am just thinking that people will definitely make porns with those glasses

[-] heartSagan5@lemmy.zip 5 points 10 hours ago

Yup, run the feeds through GenAI and bam, a fascsimile in compromising positions.

[-] Idontwanttowork@lemmy.world 4 points 9 hours ago

Interesting......

I was actually thinking in a more traditional way, you know.....just doing it while wearing the glass and record it.

But yeah....your way seems work better. Sigh, my mind is start lagging behind the AI world I guess.

[-] WitchKnight@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 9 hours ago

These people would actually have to be able to get laid for the first plan to work

[-] Idontwanttowork@lemmy.world 2 points 9 hours ago

I know. lol

Technology really evolved...... Some people of my age are laughing on their parents that they don't know computers stuff.

When my daughter grown up, I think she will laughing at me about I don't know shit about AI or whatever that will come out at her era lol

[-] Lemmchen@feddit.org 54 points 21 hours ago

How fucked up do you have to be to wear these to a date?

[-] Malica@lemmy.zip 8 points 15 hours ago

People evidently wear them on dates then feed the footage to ai in order to improve their game.

[-] DarrinBrunner@lemmy.world 9 points 12 hours ago

Narrator: It doesn't work.

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[-] Bluegrass_Addict@lemmy.ca 64 points 22 hours ago

*people wearing creep glasses is a red flag

[-] rekabis@lemmy.ca 4 points 10 hours ago

creep glasses

They’re called pervert glasses.

“Creep” isn’t inclusive enough, “pervert” is.

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this post was submitted on 15 Sep 2026
335 points (98.3% liked)

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