Through the looking glass: smartglasses face scrutiny

The backlash is clearer than the cameras they place on your face: smart glasses have a lot of detractors.

From academics calling AI glasses “out of a George Orwell novel” to Lorde telling concertgoers “don’t buy glasses,” not everyone is sold on the concept behind this latest smartphone accessory.

But the criticism isn’t slowing the spread, with Samsung and Google announcing plans to launch their own smart glasses within months, and Meta supporting the launch of its second-generation devices.

Industry analysts say the accessories are not inherently flawed, although some are used in morally questionable ways.

They say the technology requires strict privacy controls and more prominent warnings about using the devices, as well as a greater focus on what benefits users can get by putting a computer on their face.

Despite criticism, smart glasses sales are booming; IDC research shows consumers purchased more than 2.25 million devices in the first three months of 2026; That’s up 167 percent from the previous year and nearly the same number sold in all of 2024.

Social media company Meta leads the category, selling more than two-thirds of smart glasses, followed by RayNeo and Xiaomi.

The trend emerged more than a decade after the release of Google Glass, the first modern smart glasses, and a similar public outcry that labeled its users “glass holes.”

However, the latest smart glasses offer a very different experience.

While Google’s glasses are designed to transmit information to a small screen inside their frames, the new smart glasses focus on taking photos and videos hands-free, often without revealing it to people nearby.

It’s this focus, along with the actions of bad actors, that has led some to call the technology “perverted spectacles” and discredit it, says Carolina Milanesi, principal analyst at Creative Strategies.

“There’s a social aspect to this not dissimilar to the beginnings of mobile phone cameras, where people got up up skirts and took pictures,” he told AAP.

“But that doesn’t mean the companies that put these devices on the market don’t have to bear responsibility.”

Fake users used smart glasses to film women without their knowledge or consent and shared the videos online for seduction coaching purposes, for example.

Other smart glasses users placed special stickers on a light to alert bystanders while they were being filmed; these are called “hidden stickers” and are widely sold online.

Ms Milanesi says the tech giants’ response to this behavior has not been swift enough and that stronger privacy and security restrictions will be needed to protect the public and save the technology.

Making AI, cameras, microphones and speakers available to users without ever picking up the phone has significant benefits, he says, but they’re getting lost in the current conversation.

“We’re focusing on the wrong thing right now… There’s a lot of ‘I can do my vlog better without holding the phone,'” he says.

“We need companies to really point out that there are positive behaviors you can have with glasses, whether it’s translation or other accessibility features.”

Smart glasses can offer turn-by-turn navigation to the user’s ear; For example, it can quickly translate road signs in foreign languages ​​and helps low vision users read words and identify objects, according to a study published in the journal JAMA Ophthalmology.

Accessibility features are potentially overlooked in current sales presentations, says Steven Conway, director of the games and interactivity course at Swinburne University of Technology. There is more focus on fashion and film.

“This is definitely one of those technologies that seems almost parodic in how dystopian they are, straight out of a novel by George Orwell,” he says.

“Technology should be used to meet a human need, to eliminate friction in our lives, to make things better, faster, smarter, safer.”

Google and Samsung are teasing their upcoming collaboration on smart glasses based on improving everyday experiences.

The plastic frames will include a camera, light, shutter button, microphone, speakers, and sensors when they launch in the spring, and Google devices senior vice president Rick Osterloh says they’ll provide easy access to the AI ​​agent Gemini.

“These glasses allow you to take calls, listen to music and take photos,” he says.

“Just ask and you can call what you see. You can order your favorite coffee on the way to work or make a reservation at a restaurant you just passed.”

A Samsung spokesperson said the smart glasses, designed in collaboration with Gentle Monster and Warby Parker, will come with built-in privacy controls, including sensors that automatically turn off the camera when you remove the frames from your face.

Samsung Australia head of wearables Kylie Mason said the glasses would come to markets including the US and South Korea first, with a local launch to follow.

“We hope Australia will distribute them in the near future,” he says.

The reporter went to London as a guest of Samsung.