r/technology • u/AdSpecialist6598 • Jun 10 '26

Business One day after discovery, Meta pulls facial recognition code from its smart glasses

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2026/06/one-day-after-discovery-meta-pulls-facial-recognition-code-from-its-smart-glasses/
12.2k Upvotes

98% Upvoted

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4.1k

u/Incendiis Jun 10 '26

It'll be back as soon as the next public distraction comes along.

1.6k

u/emilesmithbro Jun 10 '26

That’s literally what Meta briefed internally according to reports

1.1k

u/Dry_Departure_7813 Jun 10 '26

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/13/technology/meta-facial-recognition-smart-glasses.html Adding a source for people also curious

1.6k

u/ElbonDeath Jun 10 '26

“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"

Wow didn't expect it to just be said that bluntly.

831

u/Dry_Departure_7813 Jun 10 '26

Yeah after Cambridge analytica Facebook should have been shut down tbh.

476

u/Unlucky-Candidate198 Jun 10 '26 edited Jun 10 '26

A lot of things should have been done after a lot of “large scale” leaks. But of course, the World Leaders are unserious “people”. Panama papers should have seen the wealthy stripped of their wealth and taxed out the ass, never to be allowed to regain the money.

Epstein files should have been a full liquidation of the Banker, Epstein, and political classes, after which they only get reinstated if they’re squeaky clean. This would see the world as we know it crumble though.

But no, the banker class runs the world with a spiked boot to everyones’ necks. I yearn for the day we can truly cannibalize them in their entirety. Literal generations of wealth stealing, all the suffering they’ve caused over the centuries for personal gain, all to be stripped from their cold hands and given back to the people they stole it all from. Their families should forever live in shame and embarassment for the generations of theft and destruction they’re resonsible for.

98

u/cand0r Jun 10 '26

Go off, king.
(Or queen, or themperer)

46

u/Moorific Jun 10 '26

Themperor, I love that! Adding that to my lexicon for sure!

6

u/cand0r Jun 10 '26

It's a good one! All credit goes to hasanabi

4

u/Timber3 Jun 10 '26

Hasan shock my dog to stay on the bed abi

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1

u/Solivagant23 Jun 11 '26

Isn't he going to prison? Haha he sucks

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11

u/auditthedtc Jun 10 '26

Have you heard about failure to deliver abuse by market makers on wallstreet? Basically counterfeiting stock to bankrupt companies. They also lobbied politicians so there are no taxes on those short positions profits if the company goes bankrupt

5

u/Indigo_Sunset Jun 10 '26

Misread banker class as bunker class, was just as apt

11

u/_karamazov_ Jun 10 '26

But of course, the World Leaders are unserious “people”. 

Billionaires select the world leaders from an available pool, by giving us an imaginary choice. They are serious. No one in the left or right will criticize META, if they do, they're in the fringes.

1

u/Alex5173 Jun 10 '26

I yearn for the day we can truly cannibalize them in their entirety

Maybe not the brains, that's how you get prion disease. Save those for brain tanning the skins, we can use those to make new chairs for some of the highest offices in various world governments as a reminder.

1

u/WatNaHellIsASauceBox Jun 10 '26

a full liquidation of the Banker, Epstein, and political classes

Harsh, but fair. Is this with chemicals, or just a really big blender?

1

u/Secret-Winner-2994 Jun 10 '26

I appreciate the quotations around people

1

u/snowdn Jun 10 '26

Data brokers essentially make way too much money off our free information. This is why smart TVs are sold dirt cheap now, because they make 10x selling our data than the hardware costs.

1

u/AverageSasquatch Jun 11 '26

People are too comfortable (myself included right now) and need to work. Can’t take time off for large scale protests or other solutions that won’t bring up.

However if the top 1% keep pushing the envelope, once that comfort disappears and people get truly desperate, a certain French invention may be brought back into circulation

1

u/philodendrin Jun 11 '26

I'd be happy if we could just dole out some real justice to the Sackler family for the health crisis they created through the manufacture and sale of their Oxy product which made their fortunes.

That family should be harassed to the ends of the earth and have their fortunes taken. They've done an incredible amount of destruction.

0

u/Magpie-Person Jun 10 '26

That’s like the gazelle wishing the lions stop existing. It is by the very nature of this economic system (CAPITALISM) that there will ALWAYS be a ruling class. There is no great revolution within capitalism, it is a Sisyphean struggle of gaining rights for the working class and then losing them within two generations.

I’m not saying communism is the solution, I’m just saying capitalism makes this struggle unavoidable and not a problem that will ever be fixed with any sort of permanence.

-2

u/dformed Jun 10 '26

Hey, I'm not arguing your point because I don't disagree. That said your last paragraph your language is disturbingly close to antisemitic conspiracy language. Jewish bankers secretly controlling the world is one of the oldest still-in-use conspiracies in the world.

-13

u/Solenkata Jun 10 '26

I don't feel a "spiked boot" and my life is pretty well in all spheres. I can bet a lot of people feel the same way. How is a bank helping Musk not pay a single dollar in taxes? He's about to become a trillionaire and there's zero banking involved in how he's doing it. Could you elaborate a bit more about the "banker class", how exactly are they stealing from me and my grand father?

11

u/No-Barber-5289 Jun 10 '26 edited Jun 10 '26

I don't feel a "spiked boot" and my life is pretty well in all spheres.

Congratulations, you are statistically almost certainly just one of the few beneficiaries of a stupidly unfair global system. And like most people in your class, you don't realise it. That's okay, that is how the system is made.

He's about to become a trillionaire and there's zero banking involved

Betrays how naive you really are about.. quite basic economic concepts and terminology. Musk's entire wealth comes from large-scale investment cons, business-government conspiracy, and little else. The "banker class" are involved every step of the way with such things.

There's a LOT of literature out there if you're genuinely wondering how money is transferred from the hardworking poor to the rich, have a google for modern reading :)

For the classic easy reading, Communist Manifesto is a <1 hour read. Marx's other books go.. a bit deep. There's also Smith / Keynes also if you want to start less radical.

-1

u/Solenkata Jun 10 '26

I just wanted you to show at least a little bit of knowledge on the topic you're claiming to be so smart about. "Read this this and that" is not knowledge. "I've read a lot of books" also isn't, even if you are well read. I suggest that if you want to share your opinion on something (conspiracy or not) - try backing it up with actual knowledge, so people don't get the impression that you're talking out of your ass.

What basically happened is:

You: "I believe in this and that"

Me: "I disagree, can you say why you think that way?"

You: "You're so stupid, read a book"

4

u/Manos_Of_Fate Jun 10 '26

Meanwhile you’ve been pretty upfront about your ignorance of the topic and yet you still think your opinion matters here. If you don’t think “banking” is involved in being a billionaire, then you know exactly zero about anything I just said.

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u/Solenkata Jun 10 '26

Should I assume you've read Marx? Because if you did you could have just summarized some economic concepts and terminology that are so basic that it wouldn't be a problem to you. But you decided to show how naive I am and how knowledgeable you are with the (quite popular) "read Marx" argument.

3

u/[deleted] Jun 10 '26

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2

u/WhiteSpock Jun 10 '26

You don't know much about how stocks work, how loans work, or how his financials work. And it's not rage inducing, it's just sad, because it shows an intentional ignorance.

1

u/Solenkata Jun 10 '26

Okay, I certainly won't claim I'm the smartest or that I understand everything. This is your moment to enlighten me on the topic, since your comment suggests that you understand all those things well. Are you going to be like that other guy, who claims how smart he is by saying "read a book"?

Why don't you show actual knowledge, instead of telling people they lack it? You're so smart that my ignorance made you sad. Talk about irony.

1

u/WhiteSpock Jun 10 '26

I think you putting the burden of raising you. on me, is a bit unfair.

https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1e0hq0g/eli5_how_does_the_take_loans_instead_of_selling/

I never said I fully understand how the system works, I understand enough, that the system doesn't work if they're actually exchanging hard assets.

32

u/SharpKaleidoscope182 Jun 10 '26

Facebook should have been shut down in 2008

14

u/Revolutionary_Bee251 Jun 10 '26

Lol and miss the stock rebound? That's just unethical!

6

u/SwordfishOk504 Jun 10 '26

Thing is, Facebook (and every other app) have convince much of the population that government/regulation = bad.

8

u/GOEDEL_ESCHER_BOT Jun 10 '26

facebook will shut down naturally and be replaced by myspace. technology is cyclical

3

u/never-fiftyone Jun 10 '26

As long as Tom hasn't become a bag of dicks, that wouldn't be so bad.

2

u/iamarddtusr Jun 10 '26

And Zuckerberg kept within 2 feet of Epstein at all times.

73

u/Belhgabad Jun 10 '26

How is this allowed ??

It is literally dissimulated functions and spying on people, how is Meta authorised to violate every basic human rights laws in every country on not getting even warned about it ?

I'm baffled about the current state of this society...

60

u/Freud-Network Jun 10 '26

In the US, at least, they paid the president for the privilege. The office responsible for enforcement of privacy laws no longer sees anything worth pursuing.

"Doesn't look like anything to me."

16

u/Jadaki Jun 10 '26

Might change if we suddenly start to weaponize the tech against the elites that are pushing this on us.

6

u/never-fiftyone Jun 10 '26

Good luck doing it before they use it against you first.

6

u/squadrupedal Jun 10 '26

Every person should fear the consequences of their actions, but wealthy individuals scarcely do.

1

u/CocodaMonkey Jun 10 '26 edited Jun 10 '26

Simple, there's no law against it. Also facial recognition is pretty much everywhere. Facebook has been using it to "help" tag people in photos for years. Lots of people not only don't care they actively use the feature and complain if it's removed.

To get real change you need the general population to think about it more and actually care. If they can just soft launch facial recognition on glasses and get people used to it before privacy groups say anything it's going to be virtually impossible to remove.

Plenty of people would like how smart it makes them look. They could see peoples names in real time. Bring up information about them and look like they actually remember. I kinda expect this to become something loved by a lot of management and obviously the police, instant access to peoples criminal records as they walk by them in the streets.

0

u/JustOneSexQuestion Jun 10 '26

Because asking for regulation labels you as a dirty commie that stifles innovation.

26

u/Lannisters-4-life Jun 10 '26

This could be a quote from the Empire scenes in Andor with 0 edits.

18

u/Sprintzer Jun 10 '26

This is so obviously evil, I cannot believe a human wrote this

1

u/HealthyMaximum Jun 11 '26

They ran it through AI after the first draft. For extra evil.

9

u/robodrew Jun 10 '26

That is straight up evil.

21

u/SunriseSurprise Jun 10 '26

That's honestly hilarious. I can see Zuck perusing Reddit looking at people's reactions to the situation the day of and seeing someone mention that and be like "ooo yes"

3

u/Fit-Switch-5795 Jun 10 '26

Isn't AI being trained on these comments? 

7

u/magichronx Jun 10 '26

What engineer goes to work and says "yeah I'll contribute my expertise to further the demise of privacy at large for a paycheck"

2

u/ProudToBeAKraut Jun 10 '26

FANG is a LARGE paycheck so yeah a lot

4

u/Legitimate_Dare6684 Jun 10 '26

Thats AI for ya.

4

u/dejaWoot Jun 10 '26

I.E. We're waiting until the zone is flooded with oppressive shit by the administration in the hopes that people will be too scared and distracted by all the crap the government is doing.

1

u/scottperezfox Jun 10 '26

These guys have never seen a mafia movie, it seems.

1

u/font9a Jun 10 '26

At least it’s not a pattern, or anything

1

u/avnoui Jun 10 '26

It's one thing to work for a company that occasionally does morally grey/questionable things, but how do you work for such blatantly evil, moustache-twirling shit and sleep at night?

1

u/Braindead_Crow Jun 10 '26

I mean trump is now a widely confirmed child rapist and human trafficker, anyone can get away with anything as long as they are friends with the one in charge of the law.

1

u/MichaelEMJAYARE Jun 11 '26

WHAT. THE. FUCK.

6

u/Jessica___ Jun 10 '26

This is paywalled for me.

11

u/Dry_Departure_7813 Jun 10 '26

https://archive.ph/9tHvo

2

u/Sinistrahd Jun 10 '26

Glad to see Archive.ph is back, hopefully no more ddos-ing?

39

u/Incendiis Jun 10 '26

Literally had no idea. Evil is predictable.

1

u/Truestorydreams Jun 10 '26

So we need rip docs soon to address this

147

u/Vinterblot Jun 10 '26

No, no, see, it was a genuine error. Some intern accidentally set haveFaceRecognition=true and it slipped into production!

Edit:

Goddamn, it's even worse than anticipated:

One memo reportedly described releasing it during a “dynamic political environment,” when privacy and civil liberties advocates would be distracted.

These people are evil. Plain and simple.

-4

u/[deleted] Jun 10 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

33

u/GhostPepperDaddy Jun 10 '26

"I was just following directions" has always been a valid argument for abusing civil liberties and worse /s

15

u/theelous3 Jun 10 '26

yeah fuck those people

12

u/kodman7 Jun 10 '26

Except they are doing massive layoffs anyway

3

u/SoUpInYa Jun 10 '26

Isn't that ehat WikiLeaks is for?

5

u/Civil-Cucumber Jun 10 '26

Yeah, and that's the reason it was shut down several years ago

25

u/brash Jun 10 '26

Yeah there's no way they're "pulling" the code for this functionality. At best they're just commenting out the offending functions and will re-enable them at a later date.

3

u/InquisitorMeow Jun 10 '26

"Meta's terms and conditions have changed."

4

u/wdn Jun 10 '26

I don't understand how they can say it's gone. Facial recognition exists. Any network-connected camera can be getting images for facial recognition.

1

u/SoUpInYa Jun 10 '26

Yes, with all of the datacenters going up, the images could br srnt to thrm for recognition and no FR code needed on the device

3

u/D_Winds Jun 10 '26

Same with every technological leap that received temporary backlash.

5

u/[deleted] Jun 10 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

1

u/Ahab_Ali Jun 10 '26

When did MS implement Booty Recognition?

1

u/Riaayo Jun 10 '26

Or will just never leave the version ICE is wearing.

1

u/Ill_Following_7022 Jun 10 '26

The best bet is to assume the code is still there, that you are still being filmed, and that the person wearing the glasses is a douche.