Are strangers reviewing photos from your Meta glasses? Check settings now

A single toggle determines whether images captured by Meta's AI glasses get stored, reviewed by people, and used to train Meta's models.

Meta's help page for its AI glasses names the setting "Store visual data from AI experiences", and it governs a surprisingly wide range of what happens to what the glasses see.

The setting applies specifically to the frame the glasses grab when a user asks Meta AI a question about something in front of them, such as through live AI or other multimodal features.

Meta says this data may be used to power glasses features and improve its products, and that its systems take steps like removing personal or identifiable information before anything goes toward product improvement.

These pictures do not go through this pipeline at all. Meta says that these pictures and videos remain private on the glasses until the user imports them onto the phone, at which point they function like any other photo in the gallery.

Turning off this setting means that the visual data cannot be viewed by humans, is not used for any type of training or improving products, and is not stored in any way. The company mentions a particular feature that might be affected because of turning this setting off: visual reminders might be less available.

People who mostly use the glasses for translation, music, and calls lose nothing from disabling this setting.

Where to find the toggle to review photos on Meta glasses?

The feature itself exists in the Meta AI app that can be accessed from glasses settings, then Meta AI within Experiences. It can also be set up during the initial setup of glasses or when prompted via an in-app notification, and the user is able to switch his/her decision anytime.

The fact is emphasised by Meta that toggling off the setting will apply only to future visual information but not anything that has been processed prior to this change.

Voice interactions with Meta AI, sharing information with Meta AI via Messenger or Instagram, and even metadata like AI-created text descriptions of the image or its camera exposure settings are not affected by the setting at all.