Meta embroiled in controversy after workers who viewed sexual footage from smart glasses users lost their jobs

After Meta ended its contract with Kenya-based Sama, which handled review of smart glasses footage for AI training, Sama announced that 1,108 layoffs were expected.

The contract termination came less than two months after workers disclosed that they had seen users' bathroom use and sexual activity in footage from Meta's glasses.

• Meta explained that Sama failed to meet its operational standards.
• Sama countered that it met the operational, security, and quality standards for its work with clients including Meta, and that it had never been notified of falling short of those standards.
• A Kenyan workers' organization suspected that Meta ended the contract following the employees' public statements, but Meta did not directly respond to this.

Meta acknowledged that content shared by users from smart glasses with Meta AI may sometimes be reviewed by subcontracted workers. The company explained this as a practice aimed at improving product performance, stating that it obtains clear user consent for human review.

Following reports by Swedish media, the UK's ICO and Kenya's Data Protection Commissioner began responding to or investigating privacy concerns. Meta's Ray-Ban and Oakley AI glasses offer features such as translation and vision-based question answering, but concerns are growing over non-consensual recording and the potential leakage of private footage.

The controversy has also revived debate over Meta's earlier Facebook content moderation contracts, exposing the privacy and labor risks inherent in AI data labeling and subcontracted review work.