Meta’s Ray‑Ban Stories app no longer includes the facial‑recognition module that let developers tag people in video.
The change was discovered when a GitHub user compared the app’s latest binary to the version released in March 2026 and found the FaceID library missing. Meta confirmed the removal in a brief statement to Engadget, saying the feature was “being deprecated pending further review.”
The move matters because facial‑recognition on wearables has attracted scrutiny from the EU’s Digital Services Act and several U.S. privacy bills. By pulling the code now, Meta sidesteps a potential compliance headache and softens criticism from privacy advocates who have long warned about covert surveillance on glasses.
The timing aligns with a wave of similar retreats—Apple delayed its own on‑device face‑scan for Apple Vision Pro, and Google paused a pilot of real‑time face tagging on Wear OS. Meta’s quiet pullback may simply be a risk‑avoidance tactic rather than a signal of a broader strategy shift.