Facebook’s ‘Project Aria’ Photographs the World with Camera Lenses

• Facebook is working on smart glasses that CEO Mark Zuckerberg says they will launch in 2021.
• Meanwhile, the social media giant is deploying employees and contractors in public spaces equipped with smart glasses that map the world by capturing photos.
• The initiative is known as “Project Aria”.
• The research aims to inform best practices for the future, including getting ahead of potential privacy concerns, Facebook said. In practice, the project will capture many photos of public spaces.
• Visit the Business Insider home page for more stories.

Facebook has been in a project for years that aims to replace smartphones with augmented reality glasses.

His first step toward that goal, CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a broadcast Wednesday, is to create a set of smart glasses – standard lenses, but with “smart” functionality like cameras and wireless internet connectivity.

Those glasses are expected next year as part of a partnership with Luxottica Group, the parent company of several major eyewear brands including Ray-Ban, Oakley, Sunglass Hut and LensCrafters.

But ahead of the launch of these smart glasses, Facebook is sending employees out into the wild with their own sets of research glasses equipped with a variety of cameras, similar to the mapping car that Google could use for Google Street View, but with beings humans. Participants in the initiative, known as “Aria Project”, will be deployed on Facebook campuses and in public spaces where their glasses will capture the world around them.

“Like a mapping car, all participants will be easily identifiable by their clothing,” Facebook Reality Labs director Andrew Bosworth said Wednesday.

An example participant, seen above, has Facebook Reality Labs Research written on his shirt, and his camera-enabled glasses say “Research” in large white letters.

Here’s a closer look at the glasses:

Participants are said to receive training prior to deployment and are advised not to enter public restrooms or prayer spaces while wearing the goggles.

Its goal is to map the environment “in real-world conditions, indoors and outdoors” as a means of determining best practices for a potential future where smart glasses and eventually augmented reality glasses are common.

Crucially, Bosworth said that all data collected by Project Aria participants will be “quarantined” before Facebook uses it for research. Faces and collected license plates will be blurred, he said.

You can watch the full introduction video to Project Aria right here:

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