Show HN: Glasses to detect smart-glasses that have cameras
15 comments
·November 28, 2025dotancohen
Interesting idea. It seems to me that most things which would need to be protected from hidden cameras would be stationary and not require the operator to mount the detectors on his body, but starting with mobile constraints is often helpful.
I would like to draw attention to this gem of wit, easily the best I've seen in a long time:
> I think the idea behind this approach is sound (actually it's light)
anilakar
> most things which would need to be protected from hidden cameras would be stationary
Counter-sniper systems that scan for reflections from optics have existed for twenty years already. These are indeed meant for static operation in military bases and other fixed installations.
_ache_
I agree, I laugh out loud at that pun.
mcny
Putting myself in the shoes of a qa for a second...
What is the cheapest way for me to trigger a false positive on such a detection device?
And what can we do about it?
Rinse and repeat until the cheapest cost exceeds a standard pair of smart glasses.
sspiff
I remember seeing some celebrities in the late 00s / early 10s with IR-emitting sunglasses or accessories to flood the camera sensors of paparazzi and make it harder for photographers to get spyshots of them.
Would this approach work for these camera glasses as well, simply flooding them with so much IR spectrum light that their sensors simply can't see you anymore?
arionmiles
Pretty neat idea! I love the BLE detection approach, would be pretty amazing if this works. I'll be following this with some interest!
wowamit
A much-needed project. Making yourself invisible to such privacy-invasive devices will be the need of the day. Of the two approaches you mentioned, blocking/jamming the specific wireless traffic would be pretty interesting, if possible.
_ache_
Thank you for the technical write up. I have no expertise in the BTE area but it's clear enough for me to understand.
The swap pattern is very interesting but even if it's silly, maybe experimenting with an actual camera to detect cameras may give you a good base line to what to expect from a working Rayban banner.
okincilleb
This is seriously neat. Love the name too
nullpxl
Thank you! To settle a debate between me and a friend, do you think Ray-BANNED or Ban-Rays is the better name?
louthy
Ray-Banned is a good pun, but might bring you legal trouble. I’d go with Ban-Rays
rendaw
Ban-Rays. Ray-BANNED could be read to mean that you've been banned by Ray-Ban IMO, the opposite of what's happening.
null
Scramblejams
Cool project, but I'd use the first mode to look for hidden cameras at Airbnbs!
dmead
Do you have a parts list for what's in the zuck glasses?
Hi! Recently smart-glasses with cameras like the Meta Ray-bans seem to be getting more popular. As does some people's desire to remove/cover up the recording indicator LED. I wanted to see if there's a way to detect when people are recording with these types of glasses, so a little bit ago I started working this project. I've hit a little bit of a wall though so I'm very much open to ideas!
I've written a bunch more on the link (+photos are there), but essentially this uses 2 fingerprinting approaches: - retro-reflectivity of the camera sensor by looking at IR reflections. mixed results here. - wireless traffic (primarily BLE, also looking into BTC and wifi)
For the latter, I'm currently just using an ESP32, and I can consistently detect when the Meta Raybans are 1) pairing, 2) first powered on, 3) (less consistently) when they're taken out of the charging case. When they do detect something, it plays a little jingle next to your ear.
Ideally I want to be able to detect them when they're in use, and not just at boot. I've come across the nRF52840, which seems like it can follow directed BLE traffic beyond the initial broadcast, but from my understanding it would still need to catch the first CONNECT_REQ event regardless. On the bluetooth classic side of things, all the hardware looks really expensive! Any ideas are appreciated. Thanks!