Google held an annual meeting of shareholders on Thursday and imposed stringent restrictions like prohibiting all attendees from wearing its own Google Glass headset device, according to a new report.
CNBC reported on Friday that Google's instructions for the meeting banned: "Cameras, recording devices, and other electronic devices, such as smart phones, will not be permitted at the meeting. Photography is prohibited at the meeting".
Google Glass is a wearable computing device with a head-mounted display that enables users to snap photos and record video, among other things, and therefore Google likely banned it from Thursday's meeting in California. However, the company's rules did not specifically restrict the technology by name.
Glass has spurred privacy concerns from many organizations like Consumer Watchdog. Clearly angered by Google's rules at the 2013 shareholder meeting, John M. Simpson, privacy project director at Consumer Watchdog, released a scathing press release that lambasted the Mountain View-based company.
“Google has unleashed one of the most privacy invasive devices ever,” wrote Simpson. “Google Glass aids and abets people who want to invade our privacy by videoing or photographing us surreptitiously, but when it comes to their own privacy Google executives jealously guard it.”
Simpson, who has notably been vocal about his opposition toward Glass, called the restriction "hypocritical" and mentioned Google has a “long record of making everyone else’s information public, but insisting on secrecy about its operations.”
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