Last week, Wired reported that Meta quietly pushed code for a yet-to-be-released face-recognition system supposedly designed for the company’s smart glasses. Now the publication reports that Meta has quietly removed that system from its codebase. The only part that hasn’t been quiet is Meta’s very public tantrum about the whole thing. A quick recap on the situation: On June 4, Wired published its report about a feature hidden in the Meta AI app’s code called “NameTag.” The system, which was not active or available for anyone to use, was reportedly designed to use AI to identify anyone seen through the lens of the company’s line of Ray-Ban smartglasses. If the system recognized the face, it would alert the wearer to that person’s identity. Wired noted the code for that hidden facial recognition system was available in an app that has been downloaded onto more than 50 million devices. On June 5, Meta reportedly removed the code from the most recent version of the app made available for download. So anyone who has updated their Meta AI app over the weekend presumably now has an app that is free from the code libraries for the face recognition.
That’s a pretty straightforward timeline of events to read into: Meta quietly pushed code for a controversial feature it didn’t want to make public yet, Wired spotted it and reported it, Meta got rid of it because, among other reasons, it’s creepy and weird and not going to be particularly well received.
