NearLens
Detect nearby smart glasses before they detect you.
2 followers
Detect nearby smart glasses before they detect you.
2 followers
NearLens uses Bluetooth LE to detect smart glasses nearby. Ray-Ban Meta, Snap Spectacles, and EssilorLuxottica frames broadcast a wireless signature when they are on. NearLens reads that signal. No camera, no internet, no account required. Detection runs in the background. You get an alert. Most people have no practical way to know when someone near them is wearing recording-capable glasses. This app is a direct answer to that problem.
Meta and EssilorLuxottica sold more than 7 million smart glasses in 2025, roughly three times the year before, and they are targeting 10 million a year by the end of 2026. That is millions of cameras now sitting on people's faces, and the person being recorded has no way to know it is happening. The recording light can be turned off. Most owners have never read the terms they agreed to. I built NearLens for the side of that interaction nobody designs for, the people in frame.
The detection is simple. Ray-Ban Meta, Oakley Meta, and Snap Spectacles broadcast a Bluetooth LE signature to pair with their companion apps. That signature is identifiable. NearLens reads it, matches it against the manufacturer IDs registered with the Bluetooth SIG, and alerts you. No camera. No internet. No account. Everything stays on your phone.
There is some irony in building a privacy tool to protect people from the hardware I find most interesting. I sat with that longer than I probably should have. Free on the App Store. Ask me anything about how the BLE detection works, or where this goes next.