The Talaya Brief: UK, Pakistan and South Korea move against camera smart glasses

Three governments touched the same subject in about 24 hours, and in the sources we read none of them has published final rules. Snap and Apple fill out the rest of the list.

The UK says it is looking at restricting smart glasses

Safeguarding minister Satvir Kaur told MPs on Nov. 4 that "the government is already looking into options to restrict smart glasses in certain settings and restricting the sale to certain users," The Guardian reports. She added that NHS England and the Department for Education are looking at wearable technology in certain settings. The Guardian's headline says "ban," but the minister's own words say restrict. No policy, timetable or legal mechanism was announced; our full story has the details.

Pakistan approves restrictions on camera glasses imports

Pakistan's Economic Coordination Committee has approved restrictions on importing camera-enabled smart glasses, the Finance Division said on Nov. 4, according to The Thursday Times. The statement named no brand, gave no start date and did not say whether the measure amounts to a complete ban. The committee also recommended that provinces and the Islamabad Capital Territory set workplace rules for the devices. Punjab's Home Department had already banned wearing them for 30 days from Oct. 20. Our Pakistan story covers the wording.

South Korea's president orders action on exam cheating

At his weekly meeting with senior aides on Thursday, Nov. 5, President Lee Jae Myung called for "comprehensive measures be prepared to prevent cheating using smart devices and other such equipment in all types of examinations," The Korea Herald reports. The 2027 College Scholastic Ability Test is scheduled for Nov. 19. In late October the Education Ministry announced plans to file criminal complaints against students caught wearing AI-powered smart glasses and to seek a longer exam ban, from one year to three. The paper says the ministry will also assign one staff member to each exam site nationwide to spot smart glasses during this year's test. What the new comprehensive measures will contain, and when, has not been published in the sources we read.

Snap reports $1.72 billion and says Specs ship later this fall

Snap's third-quarter revenue was $1.72 billion, up 14% year over year and within its guidance, according to a GuruFocus summary on Yahoo Finance. On the call, Chief Creative Officer Ronan Harris said the First Look pop-up in Los Angeles has hosted more than 10,000 demos and that Snap expects to begin shipping Specs later this fall. Advertising revenue grew 4%, per the same summary, and Barron's reports shares fell 9% after hours. No Specs price or ship date appears in the sources we read.

Live Rewind comes with a chime and a mic indicator

Following up on yesterday's Brief, iClarified says activating Live Rewind in the watchOS 27.3 beta plays a chime even in silent mode, and a full-screen animation and microphone indicator appear to alert people nearby. The 15-second text snippet is kept for about 30 seconds after the display dims unless saved. Saving it or asking Siri sends it to Private Cloud Compute. iClarified says Apple's explainer states the features do not create or store audio recordings. We did not read Apple's own page, and the sources we read give no release date for watchOS 27.3.