Meta Removes Facial Recognition Code from Smart Glasses App After Public Discovery
Meta removed a dormant facial recognition system called NameTag from its Meta AI companion app — used to pair Ray-Ban smart glasses to phones — just one day after WIRED reported its existence. The feature, never publicly activated, was designed to convert faces captured by the glasses' camera into biometric signatures and compare them against a locally stored database of faceprints. The swift removal raises questions about whether Meta intentionally shipped surveillance-ready code to over 50 million devices without disclosure, and has renewed calls for stronger consumer privacy legislation.
WIRED's code analysis revealed that Meta had quietly embedded a face-recognition system internally called NameTag into the Meta AI app — installed on more than 50 million phones — as early as January, despite the company publicly stating no final decision had been made on the feature. The system was designed to capture faces through the camera on Meta's Ray-Ban smart glasses, generate unique biometric faceprints, and cross-reference them against a local database; faces that went unrecognized were cropped, indexed, and stored on-device for future processing. One day after WIRED's June 4 report, Meta released an updated version of the app that stripped out nearly all NameTag-related code, including the face-recognition libraries, the recognition pipeline, the 'Person recognized' alert, and the folder used to store captured images and biometric data. Meta's VP of communications Andy Stone described the feature as 'purely exploratory,' while CTO Andrew Bosworth had called WIRED's original reporting 'incredibly misleading' and 'absolutely dishonest.' Meta declined to answer ten questions from WIRED, including whether a faceprint database had already been created, how long biometric data was retained, and whether it would ever be sent to Meta's servers. The episode has drawn criticism from privacy advocates, including the ACLU of Massachusetts, who argue it illustrates the need for enforceable state-level consumer privacy laws with private rights of action. A few residual fragments of NameTag code remain in the updated app, and Meta has not explained whether the removal was planned before WIRED's story or was a direct response to it.
What's missing
It remains unclear whether the NameTag faceprint database was ever populated with real user data before the code was removed, and Meta has not confirmed whether any biometric data collected during the period the code was present on devices has been deleted. Regulatory responses from data protection authorities in the EU or other jurisdictions with stricter biometric privacy laws have not been reported.
How coverage differed
WIRED, as the outlet that broke the story, frames the removal as a direct consequence of its investigative reporting and emphasizes Meta's evasiveness and the broader civil liberties implications. Engadget adopts a more sardonic tone — likening Meta's response to 'disappearing into the bushes like Homer Simpson' — and places greater emphasis on the broader pattern of harms associated with Meta's smart glasses, including harassment incidents and a class-action lawsuit over worker surveillance of user footage.
What different sources said
- Ars TechnicaCenter
One day after discovery, Meta pulls facial recognition code from its smart glasses
- WiredLeft
Meta Deletes Face-Recognition System From Its Smart Glasses App After WIRED Report
- EngadgetCenter
Meta quietly removes face-recognition code from its smart glasses app
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