Meta faces lawsuit over privacy concerns tied to AI smart glasses and internal content reviews

Meta is facing a new class action lawsuit over privacy concerns surrounding its AI smart glasses, after an investigation by Swedish newspapers reported that workers at a Kenya-based subcontractor were reviewing footage captured by customers’ glasses, including sensitive material such as nudity, people having sex, and individuals using the toilet.

Meta had said it was blurring faces in images, but sources challenged whether that blurring worked reliably in practice, according to the reports. The revelations also led the U.K.’s Information Commissioner’s Office to open an investigation into the issue.

The company is now also facing legal action in the United States. In a newly filed complaint, plaintiffs Gina Bartone of New Jersey and Mateo Canu of California, represented by the public interest-focused Clarkson Law Firm, claim that Meta violated privacy laws and engaged in false advertising.

According to the complaint, Meta promoted its AI smart glasses with phrases such as “designed for privacy, controlled by you,” and “built for your privacy,” language that would not reasonably lead customers to expect that footage from their glasses — including highly intimate moments — might be viewed by overseas workers. The plaintiffs say they relied on Meta’s marketing and did not see any disclaimer or other information that contradicted the company’s claimed privacy protections.

The lawsuit accuses both Meta and its glasses manufacturing partner, Luxottica of America, of conduct that allegedly violates consumer protection laws.

Clarkson Law Firm, which has filed other major lawsuits against technology companies over the years, including cases involving Apple, Google, and OpenAI, points to the scale of the matter. In 2025, more than seven million people purchased Meta’s smart glasses. The complaint says the footage captured by those devices is sent to a review pipeline, and users are not given an option to opt out.

Meta told the BBC that when users share content with Meta AI, the company uses contractors to review that information to improve people’s experience with the glasses, and that this is explained in its privacy policy. Meta also pointed to its Supplemental Meta Platforms Terms of Service, but it did not specify where that disclosure appears. The BBC reported that a reference to human review could be found in Meta’s U.K. AI terms of service.

A version of the policy that applies in the U.S. states: “In some cases, Meta will review your interactions with AIs, including the content of your conversations with or messages to AIs, and this review may be automated or manual (human).”

The complaint places significant emphasis on how the glasses were marketed, citing advertisements that highlighted privacy-related benefits, explained privacy settings, and referred to an “added layer of security.”

“You’re in control of your data and content,” one advertisement said, while explaining that owners of the smart glasses could decide which content was shared with others.

The rise of smart glasses and other forms of what critics call “luxury surveillance” technology — including always-listening AI pendants — has triggered a broader backlash. One developer even released an app that detects when smart glasses are nearby.

Meta did not comment directly on the litigation on Thursday morning. However, company spokesperson Christopher Sgro provided a broader statement on the issue, saying, “Ray-Ban Meta glasses help you use AI, hands-free, to answer questions about the world around you. Unless users choose to share media they’ve captured with Meta or others, the media stays on their device. When people share content with Meta AI, we sometimes use contractors to review this data to improve people’s experience, as many other companies do. We take steps to filter this data to protect people’s privacy and to help prevent identifying information from being reviewed.”