Employers are increasingly confronting the challenge of smart glasses in the workplace. Meta sold 7mn pairs of its smart glasses last year, produced with Essilor Luxottica, which owns the Oakley and Ray-Ban brands. The devices are already raising concerns about covert surveillance in public spaces, and those data security worries are now spilling into offices.
Privacy experts say the bigger problem is not the person wearing the glasses but everyone in frame who never agreed to be recorded, including colleagues, customers and patients. Julian Gage, founder of the data privacy services company Engage Compliance, advises companies to establish clear policies while smart glasses remain relatively unusual. "A ban you never wrote down is one you can't enforce," he says.
Some organisations have already acted. Southwest Airlines barred their use in February, New York banned smart glasses in courthouses across the state, and Stockholm-headquartered cyber security firm Outpost24 prohibited them entirely. Employment lawyers warn that recordings containing confidential client information could be mistakenly uploaded to cloud services, exposing companies to serious regulatory consequences. David Miklas, a labour and employment lawyer based in Florida, calls smart glasses "the ultimate form of shadow IT" that companies cannot track, patch or wipe remotely.
Employees are divided. Some worry about being seen as "creepy", while fans who value hands-free calls and messaging feel the rules are a knee-jerk reaction. One employee at US drinks company Keurig Dr Pepper said he was disciplined for wearing his prescription Meta glasses at work.
Source: Financial Times Companies · Summarized by HeadlinesBriefing