Smart glasses could be banned in swimming pools and changing rooms in misogyny crackdown
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Smart glasses could be banned in swimming pools and changing rooms as Government tries to crackdown on violence against women and girls.
Ministers are consulting on plans to restrict the use of smart glasses amid growing evidence they are being used to film women without their consent.
Smart glasses, the latest wearable technology phenomenon, allow the user to capture images, video and audio, and can help people communicate hands-free.
While they can prove helpful to those with impaired vision or hearing, smart glasses have also been blamed for a disturbing rise in women being filmed without their consent.
In a parliamentary debate on Wednesday, MPs raised the concerning trend of men filming women covertly through smart glasses then posting the footage online for profit.
Liberal Democrat MP Anna Sabine said: 'Women are reporting waking up after nights out to find that videos of them, filmed without their knowledge or consent by men wearing smart glasses, have gone viral online.
'The only indication anyone has that they are being filmed is a small LED in the corner of the glasses, but that is quickly disappearing, with 'ghost Meta' shops offering to remove the light entirely so that no one in a public space knows they are being filmed.'
Home Office minister Satvir Kaur responded that ministers are now considering options to restrict smart glasses 'in certain settings' and to 'certain users', adding the work 'is happening at pace.'
Smart glasses could be banned in swimming pools and changing rooms as Government tries to crackdown on violence against women and girls
Under Government plans, smart glasses could be banned in swimming pools and changing rooms – a change already implemented in some Australian councils.
The Liberal Democrats have also called on the Government to ban convicted sex offenders from purchasing the glasses.
But shadow safeguarding minister Alicia Kearns last night demanded more detail from Labour on the plans, and warned against imposing 'blanket bans'.
She said: 'Men secretly filming women is perverted, and no woman should come home from a night out to find herself on a stranger's feed.
'But Labour cannot ask for a blank cheque to decide where the public may wear a pair of glasses and who is allowed to buy them, with no detail on either.
'When we were in government, we made upskirting a criminal offence carrying up to two years behind bars, putting the punishment squarely on the offender. Labour should follow that lead and tighten the law on covert filming rather than introducing blanket bans.'
Conservative peer and women's rights campaigner Baroness Davies said smart glasses are 'yet another thing to come along that will, without doubt, be used by certain men with bad intentions'.
She added: 'It will be women, girls and children who will be the victims. I hope we can take steps before the inevitable but using common sense'.
Violence against women and girls minister Alex Davies-Jones told the Mail that smart glasses with cameras are 'particularly problematic', but pointed to the positive effects of colleagues using glasses without cameras in Parliament to help them with their work.
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