People are afraid Amazon's new smart glasses will be an Orwellian privacy nightmare
- Amazon is releasing a pair of smart glasses, the Echo Frames, which cost $180. Echo Frames have the Alexa voice assistant built-in, meaning you can talk to it anywhere, any time.
- Unlike similar devices such as Snap's Spectacles or Google's infamous $1,500 smart glasses, the Echo Frames do not have cameras to take photos or record videos; Amazon is touting this as a positive for privacy reasons.
- But some people still have concerns about taking Alexa's recording capabilities to the streets. "Pitching these devices for people's homes is one thing, but encouraging people to wear listening devices all day is a step further," one privacy advocate told Business Insider.
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Amazon is the latest major tech company to decide that what consumers really need is a smartphone on their face, and privacy activists are not convinced.
The company unveiled its first pair of smart glasses at an event on Wednesday, the Echo Frames.
The Echo Frames cost $180 and are Alexa-enabled, meaning the wearer can speak a command to Amazon's voice assistant and the glasses will hear it.
Wearers can instruct Alexa to make a call, set reminders on their phone, or play a podcast, among other things.
Amazon said that the user will be able to hear Alexa's responses via four micro speakers, which are built into the frames and pointed directly at their ears to avoid others eavesdropping around you. Moreover, the microphone can be turned off at any time, it said.
Unlike Snap's Spectacles or Google's infamous $1,500 smart glasses - which were released in 2013 and caused a privacy backlash - the Echo Frames do not have cameras to take photos or record videos.
Amazon is touting this as a positive for privacy reasons, and it's also why the smart glasses weigh just over one ounce.
But privacy advocates have concerns about taking Alexa's recording capabilities to the streets.
Amazon's Alexa home devices have already come under intense scrutiny.
Some users found that their personal conversations had been recorded and then forwarded on to friends in error and in April, Bloomberg reported that Amazon workers had been listening back to recordings and mocking them online. In response, Amazon said would be introducing a new feature on all its Alexa-enabled devices that would allow users to delete recordings.
UK privacy campaigners Big Brother Watch said Amazon's record of privacy infractions with Alexa set a poor precedent for the Echo Frames.
"Amazon has a terrible record on privacy and is releasing endless 'smart' gadgets that constantly surveil their owners' private lives," said director Silkie Carlo in a statement to Business Insider. "Pitching these devices for people's homes is one thing, but encouraging people to wear listening devices all day is a step further."
Carlo wouldn't comment on whether Amazon's glasses are at risk of conflicting with the EU's privacy law GDPR, which requires any company that does business with EU citizens to get consent from people to use their data. "I don't think we can answer it until the details and policies are published," she said. "However it is fair to describe it as a concern."
Amazon did not immediately respond to Business Insider's request for comment.
Other critics say that, unlike the widely mocked, clunky Google Glass, the Echo Frames could actually take off, meaning there'll be a bunch of wearers walking around with always-on microphones about their person.
"Amazon's enormous surveillance infrastructure and a much less obtrusive design will make Echo Frames the *actual* public privacy nightmare that we were afraid Google Glass might become," wrote one Twitter user.
She added: "and at $180?! Forget about it. These things could be everywhere."