Technology

Welcome to Meta’s future, where everyone wears cameras

Published

1 year ago

September 28, 2024

Welcome to Meta’s future, where everyone wears cameras

All around Meta’s Menlo Park campus, cameras stared at me. I’m not talking about security cameras or my fellow reporters’ DSLRs. I’m not even talking about smartphones. I mean Ray-Ban and Meta’s smart glasses, which Meta hopes we’ll all — one day, in some form — wear.

I visited Meta for this year’s Connect conference, where just about every hardware product involved cameras. They’re on the Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses that got a software update, the new Quest 3S virtual reality headset, and Meta’s prototype Orion AR glasses. Orion is what Meta calls a “time machine”: a functioning example of what full-fledged AR could look like, years before it will be consumer-ready.

But on Meta’s campus, at least, the Ray-Bans were already everywhere. It was a different kind of time machine: a glimpse into CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s future world where glasses are the new phones.

I’m conflicted about it.

The Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses.

Photo by Vjeran Pavic / The Verge

Meta really wants to put cameras on your face. The glasses, which follow 2021’s Ray-Ban Stories, are apparently making inroads on that front, as Zuckerberg told The Verge sales are going “very well.” They aren’t full-fledged AR glasses since they have no screen to display information, though they’re becoming more powerful with AI features. But they’re perfect for what the whole Meta empire is built on: encouraging people to share their lives online.

The glasses come in a variety of classic Ray-Ban styles, but for now, it’s obvious users aren’t just wearing glasses. As I wandered the campus, I spotted the telltale signs on person after person: two prominent circle cutouts at the edges of their glasses, one for a 12MP ultrawide camera and the other for an indicator light.

This light flashes when a user is taking photos and videos, and it’s generally visible even in sunlight. In theory, that should have put my mind at ease: if the light wasn’t on, I could trust nobody was capturing footage of me tucking into some lunch before my meetings.

But as I talked with people around campus, I was always slightly on edge. I found myself keenly aware of those circles, checking to see if somebody was filming me when I wasn’t paying attention. The mere potential of a recording would distract me from conversations, inserting a low hum of background anxiety.

When I put a pair on for myself, the situation changed

Then, when I put a pair on for myself, the situation suddenly changed. As a potential target of recording, I’d been hesitant, worried I might be photographed or filmed as a byproduct of making polite eye contact. With the glasses on my own face, though, I felt that I should be recording more. There’s something really compelling about the experience of a camera right at the level of your eyes. By just pressing a button on the glasses, I could take a photo or video of anything I was seeing at exactly the angle I was seeing it. No awkward fumble of pulling out my phone and hoping the moment lasted. There might be no better way to share my reality with other people.

Meta’s smart glasses have been around for a few years now, and I’m hardly the first person — or even the first person at The Verge — to be impressed by them. But this was the first time I’d seen these glasses not as early adopter tech, but as a ubiquitous product like a phone or smartwatch. I got a hint of how this seamless recording would work at scale, and the prospect is both exciting and terrifying.

The camera phone was a revolution in its own right, and we’re still grappling with its social effects. Nearly anyone can now document police brutality or capture a fleeting funny moment, but also take creepshots and post them online or (a far lesser offense, to be clear) annoy people at concerts. What will happen when even the minimal friction of pulling a phone out drops away, and billions of people can immediately snap a picture of anything they see?

Personally, I can see how incredibly useful this would be to capture candid photos of my new baby, who is already starting to recognize when a phone is taking a picture of her. But it’s not hard to imagine far more malicious uses. Sure, you might think that we all got used to everyone pointing their phone cameras at everything, but I’m not exactly sure that’s a good thing; I don’t like that there’s a possibility I end up in somebody’s TikTok just because I stepped outside the house. (The rise of sophisticated facial recognition makes the risks even greater.) With ubiquitous glasses-equipped cameras, I feel like there’s an even greater possibility that my face shows up somewhere on the internet without my permission.

There are also clear risks to integrating cameras into what is, for many people, a nonnegotiable vision aid. If you already wear glasses and switch to prescription smart glasses, you’ll either have to carry a low-tech backup or accept that they’ll stay on in some potentially very awkward places, like a public bathroom. The current Ray-Ban Meta glasses are largely sunglasses, so they’re probably not most people’s primary set. But you can get them with clear and transition lenses, and I bet Meta would like to market them more as everyday specs.

Of course, there’s no guarantee most people will buy them. The Ray-Ban Meta glasses are pretty good gadgets now, but I was at Meta’s campus meeting Meta employees to preview Meta hardware for a Meta event. It’s not surprising Meta’s latest hardware was commonplace, and it doesn’t necessarily tell us much about what people outside that world want.

Camera glasses have been just over the horizon for years now. Remember how magical I said taking pictures of what’s right in front of your eyes is? My former colleague Sean O’Kane relayed almost the exact same experience with Snap Spectacles back in 2016.

But Meta is the first company to make a credible play for mainstream acceptance. They’re a lot of fun — and that’s what scares me a little.

Technology

Two more xAI co-founders are among those leaving after the SpaceX merger

Published

2 hours ago

February 11, 2026

Press Room

Two more xAI co-founders are among those leaving after the SpaceX merger

Since the xAI-SpaceX merger announced last week, which combined the two companies (as well as social media platform X) for a reported $1.25 trillion valuation — the biggest merger of all time — a handful of xAI employees and two of its co-founders have abruptly exited the company, penning long departure announcements online. Some also announced that they were starting their own AI companies.

Co-founder Yuhai (Tony) Wu announced his departure on X, writing that it was “time for [his] next chapter.” Jimmy Ba, another co-founder, posted something similar later that day, saying it was “time to recalibrate [his] gradient on the big picture.” The departures mean that xAI is now left with only half of its original 12 co-founders on staff.

It all comes after changing plans for the future of the combined companies, which Elon Musk recently announced would involve “space-based AI” data centers and vertical integration involving “AI, rockets, space-based internet, direct-to-mobile device communications and the world’s foremost real-time information and free speech platform.” Musk reportedly also talked of plans to build an AI satellite factory and city on the moon in an internal xAI meeting.

Musk wrote on X Wednesday that “xAI was reorganized a few days ago to improve speed of execution” and claimed that the process “unfortunately required parting ways with some people,” then put out a call for more people to apply to the company. He also posted a recording of xAI’s 45-minute internal all-hands meeting that announced the changes.

“We’re organizing the company to be more effective at this scale,” Musk said during the meeting. He added that the company will now be organized in four main application areas: Grok Main and Voice, Coding, Imagine (image and video), and Macrohard (“which is intended to do full digital emulation of entire companies,” Musk said).

Technology

2026 Valentine’s romance scams and how to avoid them

Published

2 hours ago

February 11, 2026

Press Room

2026 Valentine’s romance scams and how to avoid them

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Valentine’s Day should be about connection. However, every February also becomes the busiest season of the year for romance scammers. In 2026, that risk is higher than ever.

These scams are no longer simple “lonely hearts” schemes. Instead, modern romance fraud relies on artificial intelligence, data brokers and stolen personal profiles. Rather than sending random messages and hoping for a response, scammers carefully select victims using detailed personal data. From there, they use AI to impersonate real people, create convincing conversations and build trust at scale.

As a result, if you are divorced, widowed or returning to online dating after the holidays, this is often the exact moment scammers target you.

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WHEN DATING APPS GET HACKED, YOUR PRIVATE LIFE GOES PUBLIC

Romance scams surge around Valentine’s Day as criminals use artificial intelligence and stolen data to target widowed, divorced and older adults returning to online dating. (Omar Karim/Middle East Images/AFP via Getty Images)

The new face of romance scams in 2026

Romance scams are no longer slow, one-on-one cons. They’re now high-tech operations designed to target hundreds of people at once. Here’s what’s changed:

1) AI-generated personas that look and sound real

In the past, fake profiles used stolen photos and broken English. Today, scammers use AI-generated faces, voices and videos that don’t belong to any real person, making them almost impossible to reverse search.

You may be interacting with a profile that:

Has years of realistic-looking social media posts
Shares daily photos that match the story they tell
Sends customized voice notes that sound natural
Appears on “video calls” using AI face-mapping software.

Some scam networks even create entire fake families and friend groups online, so the person appears to have a real life, real friends and real history. To the victim, it feels like a genuine connection because the “person” behaves like one in every way.

2) Automated relationship scripts that adapt to you

Behind the scenes, many scammers now use software platforms that manage dozens of conversations at once. This is known as “scamware” and is incredibly hard to flag.

These systems:

Track your replies
Flag emotional triggers (grief, loneliness, fear, trust)
Suggest responses based on your mood and history.

When you mention that you are widowed, the tone quickly becomes more comforting. Meanwhile, if you say you are financially stable, the story shifts toward so-called “business opportunities.” And if you hesitate, the system responds by introducing urgency or guilt. It feels personal, but in reality, you’re being guided through a pre-written emotional funnel designed to lead to one outcome: money.

3) Crypto and “investment romance” scams

One of the fastest-growing versions of romance fraud now blends love and money. A BBC World Service investigation recently revealed that many romance scams are now run by organized criminal networks across Southeast Asia, using what insiders call the “pig butchering” model, where victims are slowly “fattened up” with trust before being financially destroyed.

These operations use call center style setups, data broker profiles, scripted conversations and AI tools to target thousands of people at once. This is not accidental fraud. It’s an industry.

And the reason you were selected is simple. Your personal data made you easy to find, easy to profile and easy to target.

After weeks of trust-building, the scammer introduces:

A “private” crypto platform
A fake trading app
A business or investment opportunity, “they use themselves.”

They may show fake dashboards, fake profits and even let you “withdraw” small amounts at first to build trust. But once larger sums are sent, the site disappears and so does the person. There is no investment. There is no account. And there is no way to recover the funds.

AI DEEPFAKE ROMANCE SCAM STEALS WOMAN’S HOME AND LIFE SAVINGS

Data brokers selling personal details fuel a new wave of romance fraud by helping scammers select financially stable, older victims before contact is made. (Jens Büttner/picture alliance via Getty Images)

How scammers find you before you ever match

The biggest misconception is that romance scams begin on dating apps. They don’t. They begin long before that, inside massive databases run by data brokers. These companies collect and sell profiles that include:

Your age and marital status
Whether you’re widowed or divorced
Your home address history
Your phone number and email
Your family members and relatives
Your income range and retirement status.

Scammers buy this data to build shortlists of ideal victims.

The data brokers behind romance scams

They filter for:

Age 55-plus
Widowed or divorced
Living alone
Financially stable
Not active on social media.

That’s how they know who to target before the first message is ever sent.

Why are widowed and retired adults targeted first?

Scammers aren’t cruel by accident. They target people who are statistically more likely to respond. If you’ve lost a spouse, moved recently or reentered the dating world, your personal data often shows that. That makes you a priority target. And once your name lands on a scammer’s list, it can be sold again and again. That’s why many victims say, “I blocked them, but new ones keep showing up.” It’s not a coincidence. It’s data recycling.

How the scam usually unfolds

Most romance scams follow the same pattern:

Friendly introduction: A warm message. No pressure. Often references something personal about you.
Fast emotional bonding: They mirror your values, your experiences, even your grief.
Distance and excuses: They can’t meet. There’s always a reason: military deployment, overseas job, business travel.
A sudden “crisis”: Medical bills, business losses, frozen accounts, investment opportunities.
Money requests: Wire transfers, gift cards, crypto or “temporary help.”

By the time money is involved, the emotional connection is already strong. Many victims send thousands before realizing it’s a scam.

The Valentine’s Day cleanup that stops scams at the source

If you want fewer scam messages this year, you need to remove your personal information from the places scammers buy it. That’s where a data removal service comes in. While no service can guarantee the complete removal of your data from the internet, a data removal service is really a smart choice. They aren’t cheap, and neither is your privacy.

These services do all the work for you by actively monitoring and systematically erasing your personal information from hundreds of websites. It’s what gives me peace of mind and has proven to be the most effective way to erase your personal data from the internet. By limiting the information available, you reduce the risk of scammers cross-referencing data from breaches with information they might find on the dark web, making it harder for them to target you.

Check out my top picks for data removal services and get a free scan to find out if your personal information is already out on the web by visiting Cyberguy.com.

Get a free scan to find out if your personal information is already out on the web: Cyberguy.com.

Practical steps to protect yourself this February

Here’s what you can do right now:

Never send money to someone you haven’t met in person
Be skeptical of fast emotional bonding
Verify profiles with reverse image searches
Don’t share personal details early
Remove your data from broker sites.
Use strong antivirus software to block malicious links and fake login pages. Get my picks for the best 2026 antivirus protection winners for your Windows, Mac, Android and iOS devices at Cyberguy.com.

When you combine these steps, you remove the access, urgency and leverage scammers rely on.

SUPER BOWL SCAMS SURGE IN FEBRUARY AND TARGET YOUR DATA

Cybercriminals now deploy AI-generated faces, voices and scripted conversations to impersonate real people and build trust at scale in modern romance scams. (Martin Bertrand/Hans Lucas/AFP via Getty Images)

Kurt’s key takeaways

Romance scams are no longer random. They are targeted, data-driven and emotionally engineered. This Valentine’s Day, the best gift you can give yourself is privacy. By removing your personal data from broker databases, you make it harder for scammers to find you, profile you and exploit your trust. And that’s how you protect not just your heart, but your identity, your savings and your peace of mind.

Have you or someone you love been contacted by a Valentine’s Day romance scam that felt real or unsettling? Let us know your thoughts by writing to us at Cyberguy.com.

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Kurt “CyberGuy” Knutsson is an award-winning tech journalist who has a deep love of technology, gear and gadgets that make life better with his contributions for Fox News & FOX Business beginning mornings on “FOX & Friends.” Got a tech question? Get Kurt’s free CyberGuy Newsletter, share your voice, a story idea or comment at CyberGuy.com.

Technology

Uber Eats adds AI assistant to help with grocery shopping

Published

14 hours ago

February 11, 2026

Press Room

Uber Eats adds AI assistant to help with grocery shopping

Uber announced a new AI feature called “Cart Assistant” for grocery shopping in its Uber Eats app.

The new feature works a couple different ways. You can use text prompts, as you would with any other AI chatbot, to ask it to build a grocery list for you. Or you can upload a picture of your shopping list and ask it to populate your cart with all your favorite items, based on your order history. You can be as generic as you — “milk, eggs, cereal” — and the bot will make a list with all your preferred brands.

And that’s just to start out. Uber says in the coming months, Cart Assistant will add more features, including “full recipe inspiration, meal plans, and the ability to ask follow up questions, and expand to retail partners.”

But like all chatbots, Uber acknowledges that Cart Assistant may make mistakes, and urges users to double-check and confirm the results before placing any orders.

It will also only work at certain grocery stores, with Uber announcing interoperability at launch with Albertsons, Aldi, CVS, Kroger, Safeway, Sprouts, Safeway, Walgreen, and Wegmans. More stores will be added in the future, the company says.

Uber has a partnership with OpenAI to integrate Uber Eats into its own suite of apps. But Uber spokesperson Richard Foord declined to say whether the AI company’s technology was powering the new chatbot in Uber Eats. “Cart Assistant draws on publicly available LLM models as well as Uber’s own AI stack,” Foord said in an email.

Uber has been racing to add more AI-driven features to its apps, including robotaxis with Waymo and sidewalk delivery robots in several cities. The company also recently revived its AI Labs to collaborate with its partners on building better products using delivery and customer data.