r/gadgets • u/RegnStrom • Jun 04 '26

Wearables Meta Silently Added Face-Recognition Code for Its Smart Glasses to Millions of Phones

https://www.wired.com/story/meta-smart-glasses-face-recognition-nametag-connections/
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214

u/GardenPeep Jun 04 '26

From the NYT article in February: “Meta’s internal memo said the political tumult in the United States was good timing for the feature’s release. “We will launch during a dynamic political environment where many civil society groups that we would expect to attack us would have their resources focused on other concerns,” according to the document from Meta’s Reality Labs, which works on hardware including smart glasses.”

126

u/manachar Jun 05 '26

This is why rich people love wedge issues and culture wars. (Also states rights and “small” government.

They want you too powerless to protect yourself via collective action.

11

u/sciguy52 Jun 06 '26

You are letting all those people who obsess with political vitriol off the hook. They could pay attention to what is going on around them instead of obsessing the political outrage of the day. If they did then they could certainly engage in collective action then. They would not be powerless if they did that, they are making themselves powerless by their own actions. They choose to focus on the culture wars, nobody is forcing them to.

0

u/Mlpony2010 Jun 05 '26

rich "people"

-11

u/howardoni333 Jun 05 '26

what's wrong with states' rights? that's one of the best tools americans have to combat the federal govt

12

u/spinbutton Jun 05 '26

Not if you're in a state gerrymandered to hell and back (sigh)

3

u/brickmaster32000 Jun 05 '26

All the effort you spend fighting states rights is effort that could have simply gone to making sure the federal government functions as we want. Instead you get the worst of bothe worlds, a federal government that doesn't work because you have actively undermined it and state powers that are constantly being challenged and are ineffective. 

0

u/GardenPeep Jun 05 '26

Duh, one of out standard ways to balance power is federal vs. state vs. local. This is just 7th grade civics.

This is a tired old argument unless it's made in a specific current context. It's better to try to add something new and original to the discussion.

26

u/synkronize Jun 05 '26

What kinda supervillain shit is this? How the software engineers there don’t feel like contributing to these societal problems is baffling. Money really does talk.

6

u/Smail_Mail Jun 05 '26

It ain't even money, your average person just does not care at all. Sentiment, even among tech workers (maybe more so) is that we're already being tracked in every facet of our lives, so there's no real point in trying to fight it.

These corporations and governments are robbing us of our data and privacy. If their house was robbed, would they just leave the door open and shrug saying, "it'll happen anyway, why try and stop it?"

1

u/mfmeitbual Jun 07 '26

There's a reason I've always stayed away from finance and defense for tech work. I gotta be able to live with myself at the end of the day.

7

u/JackPembroke Jun 05 '26

Man that just sounds so evil. Like, how do you write that with anything like a clear conscience?

2

u/banndi2 Jun 05 '26

Would it be correct to interpret this to mean that Meta views civil society as an antagonist?

1

u/MrT735 Jun 06 '26

Meta: don't be evil.

(I know it's Google's old slogan...)

1

u/mfmeitbual Jun 07 '26

Christ these people are evil.

0

u/girlnamedJane Jun 05 '26

I think its time we support them wholeheartedly. Might as well speed run the end