Courts across England and Wales will now confiscate Meta smart glasses at the door, treating the wearable cameras as covert recording equipment—while American federal regulators and the press that should be holding them accountable stay silent as seven million pairs turn ordinary citizens into walking surveillance nodes.

The ban matters because it exposes the double standard at the heart of how we handle Big Tech. UK courts and New York's court system both reached the same conclusion within weeks of each other: a device that records video while sitting on your face is fundamentally different from a smartphone, and the people being recorded have no way to consent or even know. His Majesty's Courts & Tribunals Service confirmed the policy: glasses confiscated on entry, returned on departure. A spokesperson stated plainly: "There are clear restrictions on taking images or videos within courts and tribunals which is why the use of Meta glasses is prohibited."

Smartphones are allowed into UK courtrooms on the condition they aren't used to record—because a phone raised to film is conspicuous. Smart glasses get no such exception, and for good reason. The whole selling point of Meta's Ray-Ban line is that the camera is invisible in use. That discretion is exactly what makes the device intolerable in a courtroom, where recording is a contempt offense that protects witnesses, jurors, and the integrity of proceedings.

The ban didn't come from nowhere. Earlier this year, a claimant named Laimonas Jakštys was accused in the High Court of wearing smart glasses while giving evidence and being "assisted or coached in his replies to questions put to him during cross examination," according to judge Raquel Agnello KC. Jakštys denied using the glasses to receive answers and denied they were connected to his phone. Whether it happened or not, the plausibility alone—that a witness could be fed lines through a camera nobody could see—was enough to force institutional action.

In February, Mark Zuckerberg's own security detail wore Meta glasses during a high-profile California trial over social media addiction. The presiding judge, Carolyn B. Kuhl, threatened the guards with contempt if they had recorded proceedings. New York's unified court system followed with its own ban last month, stating it needed to ensure "individuals cannot surreptitiously record court proceedings."

Meta's defense rests on a pulsing LED light meant to signal recording and tamper-detection software meant to prevent anyone from covering it. Those are engineering answers to a social problem. A courtroom is not in the business of trusting a small LED to enforce contempt law, and neither should the public be.

The Guardian framed the glasses as "spyware" and highlighted that venues across the UK—restaurants, theatres, Wetherspoons pubs—have banned them over privacy fears, with some calling them "pervert glasses." TNW took a more analytical line, treating the court ban as old rules catching up to new hardware. The Verge, typically vocal on tech policy, ran a brief pointer to The Guardian's reporting and moved on.

Here is the real question: two of the world's busiest legal systems have now prohibited these devices from their buildings. Pubs and restaurants are doing the same. Where is the American regulatory response? Meta moved seven million pairs of these glasses last year at £269 to £469 a pop. The product's entire premise is recording people who don't know they're being recorded. The UK acted. New York acted. Washington has not—and the outlets that should be asking why are the same ones cashing Meta's ad checks.

The technology has outrun the rules. The courts are improvising. The public is being recorded without consent. And the people who claim to defend your privacy can't be bothered to cover it.