HateAid has, according to its own statements, filed criminal charges against the management of Meta, the eyewear brands Ray-Ban and Oakley (both part of EssilorLuxottica), and the optical retail chains Fielmann, Apollo-Optik, Mister Spex, and MediaMarkt with the Public Prosecutor General's Office in Frankfurt am Main. In the view of the non-profit organization, which advocates for human rights in the digital space, the sale of smart glasses with integrated cameras in Germany violates the Telecommunications Digital Services Data Protection Act (TDDDG) and therefore constitutes a criminal offense.
The TDDDG prohibits placing devices on the market that are disguised as everyday objects and are intended to film or eavesdrop on others unnoticed (§ 8 para. 1, § 27 para. 1 no. 3 in the TDDDG). HateAid believes that this offense is met by smart glasses with integrated cameras: they are a fully functional camera that looks like normal glasses. In the event of a conviction, the management faces fines or prison sentences of up to two years, as well as the confiscation of profits already made.
Wayfarer in the Crosshairs
HateAid explicitly calls for a sales ban on the AI glasses “Ray-Ban Meta Wayfarer (Gen 2)”. The organization considers this model, developed by Meta in cooperation with Ray-Ban, to be particularly dangerous because it is based on one of the best-selling sunglasses in history. Therefore, the model with a camera is hardly distinguishable from the ordinary version.
