Meta

Apple at one time considered adding a camera to the Apple Watch, but it looks like Meta may get there first. A new report suggests the company may unveil the upcoming wearable at its September event.

A Meta smartwatch with a camera was spotted in development back in 2021, but was said to have been put on pause the following year. However, a new supply-chain report says the project was revived and is now close to launch …

Meta said that it has removed 135,000 Instagram accounts for “sexualizing children,” and has launched new protections for teenage users.

A further half a million Instagram and Facebook accounts were removed by the platform when they were found to be linked to the offending profiles …

Just days after hiring Ruoming Pang, who had led Apple’s foundation model efforts, Meta is reuniting him with two former colleagues from Cupertino.

Earlier this week, Ruoming Pang, the executive who until recently led Apple’s AI models team, left the company to join Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta Superintelligence Labs, or MSL. Now, as reported by Bloomberg, we know just what it took to lure him away.

Meta’s renewed push into AI is throwing the entire market off-balance, and Apple is particularly exposed. With morale arguably at an all-time low inside Cupertino’s AI teams, Zuckerberg’s multimillion-dollar check-cutting spree may have already pulled at least one top researcher out of Apple Park. And there may be more to come.

Meta’s smart glasses experiment is moving into its next phase. After scoring a surprise hit with its Meta Ray-Ban smart glasses, the company is now teaming up with Oakley for a more rugged, sport-focused lineup and good tech upgrades. Here’s when to get them.

Update: Business Insider notes that Meta has now added a warning message when users share chat queries.

The Meta AI app has been described as “a privacy disaster,” as users unknowingly make their embarrassing questions public.

One tech writer described it as like discovering your web browser history has been public all along without you knowing it …

It looks like Meta’s smart glasses lineup is about to expand beyond Ray-Ban. A new verified Instagram page called “Oakley | Meta” popped up this week, teasing a joint product launch scheduled for Friday, June 20. Here’s what to expect.

I bet nobody had ‘Meta arguing for privacy on Apple’s behalf’ on their tech bingo cards, but that’s exactly what the social networking company is hoping to do.

Meta has asked the court’s permission to give evidence in support of Apple’s privacy battle with the British government over a feature intended to apply end-to-end encryption to almost all iCloud data …

Today, Meta shared (via The Verge) a few new details about Aria Gen 2, its next-generation experimental smart glasses.

While they’re still not meant for consumers, the hardware show just how fast Meta is moving and how far ahead it is thinking when it comes to the future of wearables, AI, and spatial computing. It also signals how quickly Apple will have to work if it really intends to do more than simply try to catch up. Again.

Tim Cook was recently reported to be determined to bring out an Apple Glasses product ahead of Meta’s version, with one insider going so far as to say the CEO “cares about nothing else.”

A new report suggests that Meta is changing its own headset plans in what may be a move geared to accelerate its moves towards an AR glasses product …

The high-stakes antitrust case that could force Meta to unwind Instagram and WhatsApp has officially wrapped. After six weeks of testimony and 38 witnesses, including Mark Zuckerberg himself, it is now up to Judge James E. Boasberg to make history, whichever way he rules.

Apple’s developer relations are a major point of controversy at the moment following the court ruling related to Epic Games. Earlier this week, Mark Zuckerberg discussed Meta’s relationship with Apple in an interview that was just published at Stratechery. Here’s what he said.

Meta’s encrypted messaging app WhatsApp will use an approach pioneered by Apple to add AI capabilities without compromising privacy.

The company has announced that it will use tech it calls Private Processing, which appears to exactly replicate Apple’s Private Cloud Compute …

Ray-Ban Meta glasses now offer a live translation feature to all owners, after an earlier small-scale test. You can download language packs in advance, enabling translation even when you don’t have a mobile data connection.

The Meta AI features, which lets you ask the glasses questions about what you’re seeing, has also now launched in EU countries, and there are new frame and lens combos too …

WhatsApp users have expressed frustration at the fact that there is no way to remove the new Meta AI chatbot feature from the messaging app, raising concerns that the company is seeking to use their private chats to train the bot.

Meta says the AI chatbot can’t read messages unless one of the chat participants chooses to share it, but adds that the company is “listening to feedback” from users …

The Instagram app has its own built-in camera, so users can take photos and videos for Stories without needing another app. While users can save this content to their photo library, some people have noticed that the Save button on the Instagram camera has now disappeared – but luckily there’s already a fix available.

WhatsApp this week released a major update that adds a new way to create and manage sticker packs without having to leave the app. Read on as we detail exactly what’s new for WhatsApp users.