Two former Harvard students, AnhPhu Nguyen and Caine Ardayfio, are developing AI-powered smart glasses named Halo X, designed to continuously listen, record, and transcribe conversations while delivering relevant information to the user in real-time. The startup has raised $1 million in funding, with pre-orders starting at $249. Nguyen stated the intention is to enhance the user’s cognitive capabilities upon wearing the glasses.
The technology utilizes AI to provide prompts during conversations, potentially assisting users with complex queries or vocabulary. However, concerns have arisen regarding privacy implications, as the Halo X glasses do not feature an external indicator to inform others when recording is occurring, which contrasts with similar technologies like Meta’s smart glasses, which include such indicators.
Privacy advocates caution about the effects of increasingly casual covert recording devices on social norms. Eva Galperin from the Electronic Frontier Foundation highlighted issues surrounding consent and the expectation of privacy in conversations, particularly as several U.S. states impose legal restrictions on covert recording. Although Ardayfio mentioned that it is ultimately the user’s responsibility to obtain consent, concerns about data storage and security remain.
Nguyen and Ardayfio have a prior history with privacy-related technology; while at Harvard, they created a project that integrated facial recognition capabilities into Meta Ray-Ban glasses to demonstrate its potential for misuse. Currently, the Halo X glasses do not include a camera and rely on a tethered smartphone app for functionality, using Google’s AI technologies for processing queries.
While they project aspirations for data encryption and compliance with security standards, concrete details about data handling and privacy safeguards have not been provided. As the technology approaches launch, questions about user trust and ethical implications continue to be significant points of discussion.
Source: https://techcrunch.com/2025/08/20/harvard-dropouts-to-launch-always-on-ai-smart-glasses-that-listen-and-record-every-conversation/