Delhi man sends legal notice to Insta creator, Meta over ‘spy’ glasses video reel

The legal notice dated August 24 was sent by Apar Gupta, a lawyer and founder of the digital rights advocacy group Internet Freedom Foundation (IFF)

A Delhi resident has sent a legal notice to Meta and an Instagram creator, alleging that he was covertly recorded using camera-equipped smart glasses at a café in Delhi’s Khan Market in July and that footage of the incident was later posted as a reel that mocked him.

The legal notice argues that Meta also shares liability, both as the platform that verified and monetised the video clip and as the maker of a device “deliberately designed to be indistinguishable from ordinary fashion eyewear.” (HT Photo)

The notice, dated August 24 and sent by lawyer Apar Gupta, founder of digital rights advocacy group Internet Freedom Foundation (IFF), accuses the creator of privacy invasion, defamation and harassment. It also alleges that Meta shares liability as the platform that verified and monetised the account and as a maker of the glasses, which the notice describes as being “deliberately designed to be indistinguishable from ordinary fashion eyewear”.

According to the notice, the incident took place on July 24, when the complainant was alone at a cafe in Khan Market. It alleged that a stranger approached him, asked unsolicited questions and followed him around the cafe until he changed seats.

“A complete stranger whom our client had never met, accosted our client and proceeded to pester, insult and harass him with a series of unsolicited and nonsensical questions and remarks, following him within the café,” the notice stated.

The complainant reported the post the following day, but the notice alleged that Instagram did not have a category specifically covering non-consensual recording, forcing him to report it under “bullying”. According to the notice, Meta twice responded that the material “doesn’t go against our Community Standards”, citing its harassment and bullying rules.

The notice further alleged that the account briefly disappeared on August 9 before resurfacing with the video still available. According to IFF, the video had received more than 419,000 views, 15,700 likes and over 500 comments by August 6.

The notice sought removal of the material, a public apology, disclosure of everyone involved in recording the incident and preservation of the video’s metadata. To be sure, no court petition has been filed and the notice does not identify the Instagram creator.

While Meta did not directly address the allegations, a company spokesperson shared information with HT about privacy safeguards on its glasses, including a capture LED that cannot be switched off and which, Meta said, disables recording if tampered with.

Instagram head Adam Mosseri said in a recent weekly AMA that Meta cannot prevent people from filming others, but tries to ensure the recording light remains on. He said the company would remove harassing “pickup line”-style content and did not want people “surreptitiously taking videos of other people and harassing them”.

Dhruv Garg, partner at policy advisory Indian Governance and Policy Project, said the legal question was more nuanced than whether recording in public was simply permitted or prohibited. “Indian law does not create a general consent requirement for every public recording,” he said.

However, Garg said being visible in a public place did not necessarily mean a person had made their personal data “publicly available” under the law. He said the issue would also involve whether the platform could identify the person, and argued that privacy safeguards should account for context, persistence and dissemination rather than treating the fact that a recording was made in a public place as decisive.