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.
How fucked up do you have to be to wear these to a date?
People evidently wear them on dates then feed the footage to ai in order to improve their game.
Narrator: It doesn’t work.
Maybe they poor and have no other glasses 😥
I know, right? Why won’t anyone think of the poor techbros!
Right. With prescription lenses the perv glasses are north of $500. If you need to perv and you can’t afford another pair, then you just need to wear the perv glasses all the time.
MenWearing Meta Glasseson DatesIs an Instant Red FlagI’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.
People are also uncomfortable about wearing glasses that look anything like pervert glasses.
So you mean if I buy these I don’t have to talk to people? Where do I sign up?
You know you can just not talk to people, you don’t have to creep people out to achieve that goal
The key is buying a pair of regular glasses that look similar enough, and put some logo stickers on to fake it. Then, you don’t support evil, and you still don’t have to talk to people. Win win!
I would advise against this. The time is coming where people wearing perv glasses are going to be encountering bats to the face. BTW, I also know of a couple of people working on adversarial QR codes to attack the glasses’ systems.
What’s wrong with good old fashioned headphones/mean mug?
Just start talking to yourself like you’re on Bluetooth. “Hold on, this person is trying to talk to me, one sec”
I actually think these kind of technology have potential great use.
Eg. Real time translation with subtitles / vocie to text translation. It will be great when you travel to othet counties and talk to the locals.
Or like…
Real time navigation from GPS
Calories control etc.
I think this technology is great, but people just gonna abuse it
The potential is significant for people with vision issues, but the glasses are the product of one of the worlds most famous creeps.
I am just thinking that people will definitely make porns with those glasses
Yup, run the feeds through GenAI and bam, a fascsimile in compromising positions.
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.
These people would actually have to be able to get laid for the first plan to work
I wear these sunglasses every day, I’m not even logged into the app since they made it the ai app and haven’t backed up my photos on 2 years. I also didn’t purchase them, am I a creep?
You are literally a walking security cam. Yes, its creepy dude.
Ye bro ignore everything in my comment sweet, do you feel the same about dash cams? And like for real, I don’t have social media and the glasses aren’t linked to an app, how in the fucking world am I a security camera?
Your comment seems deliberately vague.
Why do you wear these ugly sunglasses that fell from the sky?
Just to reiterate, the glasses are absolutely capable of transmitting the video feeds anyways without you ever logging into the app or backing up photos. Meta has a gigantic financial incentive to do so, as it gives them free fresh training data for multiple AI use-cases, and marketing data on you and others.
Can you guarantee that they aren’t doing that? Because if not, it seems justified for other people who don’t feel comfortable taking that risk not to be forced into taking it by you wearing the glasses. At the very least, you ARE forcing people into taking that risk without their permission.
Are you recording people without their consent?
What do you want me to say here? Before the app update I would like, take photos or videos of traffic when driving? Sometimes when I’m on a bike there may be people in the background?
You asked if you were a creep for wearing the smart glasses, so I asked if you’re recording people without their consent. I think that’s the line. It is creepy to record people without them knowing.
Recording your drive or your bike route is akin to dash cam videos. Not quite the same as recording a person you’re sitting across from at a table.
Do you only use those glasses as dash cam replacements?
