In a new piece by 404 Media, two Harvard students introduced a compelling but terrifying invention: smart glasses that can potentially dox you. In an interview with the outlet, Cain Ardayfio and AnhPhu Nguyen explained exactly how the glasses worked.
According to the outlet, these smart glasses are equipped with sophisticated facial recognition technology that not only identifies people, but also pulls up a menagerie of their personal details already on the internet, like their phone number, home address, and family members.
How does I-XRAY work?
The project, which is entitled I-XRAY, is designed to raise awareness of how far this technology can go — and how much of a risk it can pose, 404 Media report.
It uses Meta’s Rey-Ban smart glasses to capture people’s faces and then perform searches on facial-recognition sites like Pimeyes. It also scrapes URLs for biographical details including jobs, schools, and family members.
Because of the potential danger, the creators tell 404 Media they are not releasing the product’s code. However, they did do a public demonstration of the technology, wherein they were able to identify complete strangers on the subway.
“I think people could definitely take the idea and run with it,” Ardayfio said in an interview. If people do run with this idea, I think that’s really bad. I would hope that awareness that we’ve spread on how to protect your data would outweigh any of the negative impacts this could have.”
