BRUSSELS — Privacy regulators want people wearing smart glasses in public to look and sound like a truck backing down a road.

Europe’s powerful data regulators have made stringent new recommendations on how smart glasses should alert people that the wearable devices are filming, including a combination of flashing lights, audio alerts and notifications sent to the phones of people nearby.

The European Data Protection Board (EDPB), made up of national privacy regulators across Europe, issued a statement about smart glasses on Tuesday, following a meeting in Brussels.

Privacy regulators are putting forward a united front on smart glasses, as privacy concerns about the wearable technology have multiplied since videos made with them have begun spreading online without the knowledge or consent of those being filmed.

The statement is not legally binding but will guide how privacy regulators in Europe assess whether smart glasses users and manufacturers are complying with EU privacy rules like the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

The regulators said smart glasses manufacturers should implement a combination of transparency measures to make other people aware that they are being recorded.

The measures may include lights or sounds when users are recording, requiring smart glasses users to activate them with an audible voice command, sending notifications to the smartphones of people nearby and other design “clues” to help people spot smart glasses.

The group of privacy regulators said that not only should users of smart glasses respect other people’s privacy but that the devices’ manufacturers and people providing connected apps or services may also be responsible for making sure they comply with privacy rules.

The GDPR applies to companies and organizations, and doesn’t apply when people process personal data in a household context. The regulators said this household exemption should be “narrowly interpreted” when it comes to smart glasses, and would not apply when someone shares photos or videos of others “to an indefinite number of persons on a public social media account.”

Tech firms like Meta have pitched their smart glasses to consumers on the basis that they are sleek and discreet. Meta has included an LED light in its smart glasses, which activates while recording, which it has said is a key privacy safeguard.

Samsung and Google have also recently announced that they’re collaborating on a new line of “intelligent eyewear” set to launch later this year, and Apple is reportedly aiming to hit the market with its own smart glasses by the end of 2027. 

The regulators’ statement could now force smart glasses manufacturers to reassess whether and how they sell smart glasses to European consumers. The EDPB called for industry-wide standards to be developed to make sure people are able to spot smart glasses and understand how they process data.

The European group of privacy regulators also commissioned a study into the social acceptability of smart glasses, published today.

LONDON — Britain’s spies will have a leading role in Britain’s preparation for AI threats, the head of MI5 announced on Tuesday, after warning the technology could enable terrorists to access bioweapons.

Ken McCallum, director general of the U.K.’s domestic intelligence agency has established the AI Threat Assessment Centre to help determine how the government views potential threats.

Giving his annual threat update from MI5 headquarters in London, McCallum said: “Human history has given us no experience of facing an actor which is smarter than we are, is capable of outthinking us.”

He stressed the “real” risks of AI, saying MI5 has caught terrorists seeking to use AI to “improve their reconnaissance and attack methodologies,” in addition to the danger of AI-enabled drones.

Though it has not yet been “realized,” he said he attaches “the greatest weight” to AI’s potential to “change the stakes on existing or even new bioweapons.”

He said “low-capability” terrorists may get a “capability” uplift if the safety guardrails in AI models don’t work as intended. 

He added that for a long time “many terrorists would dearly love” access to chemical, biological or radiological weapons, but that it has been hard for them to achieve.

“One risk is that AI could enable dangerous knowledge to get into the hands of people who […] didn’t have that knowledge.”

McCallum added that “sober attention” must be given to the risk that “AI could generate novel pathogens not previously seen.” He noted that the government is taking “additional steps” on bioweapons. 

One thing that “does trouble me”, McCallum said, is the pace at which the world is evolving. He noted that the “weird bits inside MI5” that focus on how Britain’s adversaries will act in five years from now are seeing those timelines shortening due to AI.

He said it is now his responsibility to “drag my organization forwards at a faster pace than human beings generally want to be dragged.”

Sifting threats from hype

The new threat assessment centre, known as AITAC, will bring together expertise from bodies including Britain’s AI Security Institute, National Crime Agency, and the National Cyber Security Centre to “separate the bluster from the realities” of AI’s threat to the British public.

This is the third center of its kind MI5 has set up, after creating similar units dedicated to analyzing terrorism and state threats.

Asked how the agency would work, McCallum said it would look at emerging trends and how the U.K. can best think about and prioritize the various manifestations of AI threats. 

Though the government, rather than AITAC, will decide the response to AI, McCallum said it was partly set up to avoid “competitive analysis, slightly conflicting and confusing messages that otherwise might exist, where you have different departments offering their own opinion” on the issue.

He said that it would enable everyone to have “a single version of the truth, a single understanding, a single lexicon, typography.”

McCallum also said MI5 will now give national resilience — such as protecting critical infrastructure, countering cognitive warfare, and addressing technology threats — “front-rank mission status” alongside its twin roles of countering state threats and terrorism.

He noted that MI5 is now devoting more resources to countering state threats than it was during the Cold War, noting an uptick in anti-immigration cases tipping into terrorist intent, while Iran has shifted its ambitions to hit harder targets such as military sites.

PARIS — French center-right presidential candidate Edouard Philippe accused his far-right rival Marine Le Pen of trying to force a Frexit in disguise with her euroskeptic campaign promises.

“There is something in Marine Le Pen’s proposals that has the potential to blow Europe up, or let’s say to crack it open,” Philippe said at POLITICO’s Paris Competitiveness Summit on Tuesday.

The former prime minister — who is currently the best-placed centrist candidate to challenge the front-running Le Pen, according to recent polls — said Le Pen’s plan to unilaterally demand a drastic cut to France’s contribution to the EU budget was akin to “saying you want out of Europe” without openly advocating for leaving the bloc. Le Pen had previously called for a referendum in France on leaving the EU but dropped the proposal after her crushing defeat to Emmanuel Macron in the 2017 presidential election. Her party, the National Rally, now says it wants to change the EU from within.

Philippe, a fiscal conservative who has been pitching himself as the voice of reason in a campaign dominated by populist rivals, also slammed budget plans Le Pen unveiled last week as “grotesque,” accusing her of pitching “fantasy” savings.

Le Pen’s fiscal plans have faced serious scrutiny since being presented, with many observers saying they either lack key details or overestimate savings on major proposals like immigration. Progressive think tank Terra Nova wrote in a note out Tuesday that Le Pen’s budget presentation was “riddled with errors and contradictions” as well as “botched estimates.”

“She isn’t even able to estimate the cost of the pension reform she is proposing,” Philippe said.

Le Pen said in August that her plan to bring France’s legal retirement age back down to 62 for most workers would cost €9 billion a year, and last week she said she would lay out at a later stage how she intends to fund her flagship pledge. However, the Institut Montaigne, a fiscally conservative think tank, estimated the proposal would cost €34.7 billion a year.

Philippe is hoping to convince voters that his fiscally conservative agenda is the right path in a country burdened by a ballooning public debt and a budget deficit still above 5% of gross domestic product, in breach of EU rules.

Philippe said France needed to get its finances back on track to regain credibility on the European stage after a “loss of influence” over the past few years.

Though he currently leads a crowded field of centrist candidates, Philippe’s campaign has struggled in recent weeks to gain momentum — and far-left candidate Jean-Luc Mélenchon is now challenging the former PM for second place in the polls. France’s presidential election goes to a runoff if no candidate receives more than 50% of the vote, and Le Pen’s strong poll numbers all but guarantee her a spot in the second round.

Tough on China

The former prime minister pitched a pragmatic European agenda with less regulatory burden, more focus on investment and a tougher approach to China.

Philippe had some harsh criticism for an already embattled flagship measure of the EU’s green deal, saying the 2035 combustion engine ban has been “disastrous.”

There was “a great naiveté toward China,” which ultimately benefited from Europe’s push on electric vehicles, Philippe said.

“We need to much better protect our market,” he added. “If one wants access to the European market, one has to manufacture in Europe. If a carmaker doesn’t manufacture here, then we have to slap high tariffs.”

The EU is in the process of drawing up new “Made in Europe” rules that would favor European producers over those outside the bloc, in response to trade practices by competitors like China and the United States.

Shortly before Philippe took the stage, European Commissioner for Industry Stéphane Séjourné said at the POLITICO event that a Franco-German deal trading stronger protections on the definition of Made in Europe in exchange for a loosening of combustion engine rules should be finalized “in the next few hours or in the next few days.”

On artificial intelligence, Philippe aligned himself with Macron, advocating for European sovereignty in the field and the need to regulate what he described as “an instrument of power.”

“What I see is an AI world making money for the U.S. with European savings and European data, and that bugs me,” he said.