The privacy fight around Meta’s smart glasses now has a federal workplace dimension: immigration enforcement staff have been told to stop wearing the devices on the job.

The warning, first reported by The New York Times, said the wearables “could unintentionally capture, record, or transmit sensitive information,” jeopardizing privacy and legal protections. It reaches every ICE employee, not just officers in the field. Homeland Security officials told the Times the restriction only reaffirms a standing ban on personally owned body-worn cameras.

The message was hardly theoretical. Border patrol officers have been photographed wearing Meta glasses during operations for months, including one who recorded video while on duty and another who showed up to an immigration raid in a pair. The Independent counted sightings across at least six states.

What makes the memo notable is what ICE is reportedly planning next: budget documents uncovered by journalist Ken Klippenstein point to agency ambitions for custom smart glasses with biometric identification features as early as next year. Meta itself has stayed silent on whether its hardware fits law enforcement work, though the timing is awkward given the company’s ongoing struggles with public perception over facial recognition experiments and a privacy LED that critics call trivial to defeat.

Phones and other devices remain permitted on the job, so the restriction targets face-worn cameras specifically. It signals that the recording capability built into smart glasses is now a workplace policy question, not just a courtroom or venue one.

Source: Engadget