A judge scolded Mark Zuckerberg’s team for wearing camera-equipped AI glasses made by his own company during his landmark social media trial.
It is unclear whether members of Zuckerberg’s team wore Ray-Ban Meta AI glasses—which can capture photos, video, audio, and interact with an AI assistant—inside the courtroom, but according to CBS News, the California judge warned that if anything had been recorded, it must be deleted or the team could be held in contempt.
“This is very serious,” said Judge Carolyn Kuhl, as the use of recording devices is permitted only for authorized court and court security personnel in Los Angeles County Superior Court, where the trial is being held.
According to CBS News, Kuhl ordered anyone in court wearing Meta glasses to immediately remove them and stated that any technology capable of identifying jurors’ identities was banned.
A Meta spokesperson told the Daily Beast that the glasses were not used for recording and do not allow for facial recognition.
The glasses were not the first mishap for Zuckerberg’s team since the landmark trial began. A group of parents accuses him of intentionally designing Meta’s platforms to be addictive to children and harm their mental health.
On Wednesday, the 41-year-old multibillionaire appeared for his first day in court wearing a navy suit that appeared ill-fitting, facing the jury for the first time in a courtroom that for weeks had been filled with parents who say their children’s deaths were connected to harm they experienced on social media.
Zuckerberg faced questions from lawyers on behalf of a now 20-year-old woman identified by the initials KGM, who claims using social media at a young age made her addicted to the apps, and exacerbated her depression and body image issues.
“If you do something that’s not good for people, maybe they’ll spend more time [on Instagram] short term, but if they’re not happy with it, they’re not going to use it over time,” Zuckerberg said at Wednesday’s trial when asked if his company wants people to be addicted to social media.
The outcome of the current case is the first in a consolidated group of cases from 1,600 plaintiffs and could determine how thousands of similar lawsuits against social media giants might play out.
The trial comes as the Meta CEO has been cozying up to President Donald Trump—attending the president’s 2025 inauguration, purchasing a mansion near Trump’s daughter Ivanka this month, and facing scrutiny after his company was found censoring a site that identified federal agents following the fatal shooting of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis.
In Los Angeles, the jury must reach a three-fourths agreement—9 out of 12 jurors—to side with either KGM or Meta.
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