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Councillor calls for ban on smart glasses in council-run facilities.
By Mat Morgan
EVERYONE should feel comfortable and safe in Bass Coast.
That is particularly important in places like swimming pools, or other facilities, where children, families and vulnerable members of our community should be able to access our services and facilities without wondering if they or their children are being secretly recorded.
We now have glasses that look like ordinary eyewear but contain recording technology. They can be worn discreetly, and unlike someone holding up a phone or camera, the person being recorded may have absolutely no idea that they’re being filmed.
Meta glasses were and are a problem, but they’re prohibitively expensive. The urgency of this motion comes as Kmart and other retailers are selling cheap imported smart glasses, selling for less than $100. Targeting their advertising at kids.
What was a niche problem is now a very serious privacy issue in our community, putting personal data and community safety at risk.
And I’m sorry to have to mention this, but importantly. The dystopian collaboration between secret recording glasses, and unregulated AI software, now means anyone with a $100 pair of smart glasses and an internet connection can use Elon Musk’s Grok program to produce non-consensual deepfake pornography.
Cr Morgan’s notice of motion to Wednesday's council meeting calls for:
- A report on updating Council’s Conditions of Entry to prohibit the use of ‘smart glasses’ with recording capabilities at all council run facilities, subject to any necessary exclusions for accessibility needs; and
- Write to the federal Minister for Communications to update the Privacy Act so filming, storing, or sharing footage from smart glasses without consent is in breach of the Act.
The motion was carried 8-1. Cr Meg Edwards was the sole dissenter.
We should not require a parent to become an expert in surveillance technology before deciding whether it’s safe to take their kid to the local swimming pool.
And we should not expect children to understand that the person standing nearby wearing a completely ordinary-looking pair of glasses may potentially be recording them.
That is why this is fundamentally an issue about consent.
There is an important distinction between ordinary photography and covert surveillance.
If someone wants to take a photo with a mobile phone, there is generally a visible device. This is an issue about a recording device that is built into something that does not look like a recording device.
where the people being filmed have no meaningful opportunity to know about it or consent to it.
I want an import ban, I want the Federal Minister to update the privacy Act, and bring it out of the dark ages. So this motion proposes writing to the Minister and telling the federal government to get their skates on.
But as a Council, we have an opportunity to act where we have direct responsibility to clearly communicate our expectations for people using council facilities.
We don't allow people to wander into change rooms filming on their phones.
Smart glasses shouldn’t create a loophole simply because the camera is hidden inside the frame
And I think there is also an important gendered dimension to this conversation.
Women and girls have spent far too long being told to modify their behaviour because of the possibility of almost always men harassing, abusing or sexually objectifying them. Let’s not facilitate another round of that.
I’m going to step up for our community, and I’m going to step on these pervert glasses.
The responsibility should be on the person using the technology, and on the institutions responsible for these spaces, to establish clear boundaries.
That is what good public policy looks like.
We identify a foreseeable harm.
We listen to the community.
And we put sensible protections in place before that harm becomes normalised.
And most importantly, it sends a clear message that in Bass Coast, consent matters.