Meta silently added face-recognition code to millions of phones
Researchers discovered unreleased "NameTag" face-recognition code embedded in Meta's smart-glasses platform on millions of phones. NameTag is designed to convert faces captured by the glasses into unique biometric signatures, called faceprints, and compare each against faceprints stored locally on the user's phone. The code revives a capability Meta said it had sunsetted in 2021, when the company announced it deleted more than a billion Facebook faceprints. If activated, the system would let wearers identify people without a central database, raising new privacy, consent, and safety concerns because phones could become searchable stores of biometric IDs.
Code reviewed by WIRED uncovered an unreleased face-recognition system embedded in Meta’s smart glasses platform. Internally called “NameTag,” it’s designed to identify people via biometric data stored on users’ phones.
WIRED17If activated, NameTag will transform faces captured by Meta's glasses into unique biometric signatures, commonly known as faceprints, and check each one against faceprints stored on the user’s phone.
jendem74.bsky.social17Smart glasses need to be illegal. 💯 illegal
Savina the Alchemist12You know, this looks like the kind of thing the EU is gonna absolutely ban. The privacy implications are strictly insane. I don’t hate technology, but I loathe the humans trying to turn the world into a stupider blend of Soylent Green, Brazil, Escape from NY, and Demolition Man
MichiFinds6That's wild! A built-in facial recognition system could change the game for smart glasses, but how secure is NameTag and what are its implications? 🤔
SoloSojourner4Both Meta’s smart glasses and the Nancy Guthrie Ring/Nest case highlight the same underlying truth: consumer devices often ship with powerful surveillance capabilities already embedded, and whether those features are “enabled” or “accessible” depends less on hardware limits 1/3 #Privacy #Vote2026
xsxbxwx.bsky.social2Dear tech industry: just because you can doesn’t mean you should.
Auntie Ketzirah2These glasses should be illegal. For so many fucking reasons.
We reported earlier this year on Meta's plans to roll out a facial recognition feature in its smart glasses and the company said it was "still thinking through options." Now Wired discovers that the code to do it is already in Meta's AI app: www.wired.com/story/meta-s...
Tessa Brown9I want my face back
dell cameron5thanks for sharing and busting the door open on this
SwiftOnSecurity4Glad to keep my Wired sub going.
Jean-Francois Rioux3Meta doing what meta does best - acting in complete disregard of regulations and ethical considerations. They will then issue a "oops, sorry, we didn't intend to. Won't happen again". But happen again, it will.
Gwen J. S. Aber (she/her)3Isn’t this some sort of identity theft or invasion of privacy, or am I still imagining I live in the 20th century?
While dormant, three AI models — for face detection, cropping, and encoding — have been pushed from Meta's servers. The system is designed to pull faceprints from those servers and store them locally. (Meta says it isn't building a central face database.) www.wired.com/story/meta-s...
dell cameron151WIRED worked with two outside experts to confirm our findings.
Doctor Synth12Why would anyone take what Mark Zuckerberg says at face value?
Cyrez10If Meta openly says they're not going to do something, I just assume they're going to do it anyway and not tell anybody.
Lyse4I fail to see what other purpose this could serve other than a database
bettylinguini.bsky.social2He was very serious when he said he wanted a Facebook
Debbie Hemenway2Is there something stupider than 'smart glasses'? The people who buy them?
