The federal government just knocked back a smart glasses ban and told venues to sort it out themselves

The federal government had a real chance to ban smart glasses this week. Instead it handed the problem to pub bouncers, gym managers and shopping centre security guards, and called it a policy.

Attorney-General Michelle Rowland released draft privacy law reforms on Monday, pitched as the toughest shake-up in a generation. Smart glasses, the wearable cameras critics have nicknamed "pervert glasses" for their covert filming ability, were front and centre in the debate. An outright ban was not.

Rowland was blunt about it. The Privacy Act consultation, she said, "does not go to issues of import restrictions." The Greens and a chunk of the crossbench wanted a 12-month freeze on imports while the law caught up with the tech. Senator David Shoebridge called the draft reforms a step forward but said they still don't force manufacturers to add a light, sound or any visible sign a pair of glasses is recording.

So who's actually setting the rules. Venues are. Rowland said councils and businesses, think retail shops with change rooms or council-run childcare centres, can restrict smart glasses use however they see fit. Brisbane City Council has already done exactly that, banning covert filming with the glasses at its public pools last week. Expect every local pool, gym and shopping strip in the country to start drafting their own version.

There is more happening in the reforms than the glasses fight. A new "right to erasure" would let people demand large platforms wipe their personal data, similar to protections already in place in the European Union. A separate tool called IDLock, rolling out through myGov, will let people block and unblock how their ID documents get used for verification.

None of it touches the actual glasses. The eSafety Commissioner wants manufacturers to auto blur faces, delay livestreaming and add clear recording indicators, but that is a request, not a law. Meanwhile the price of entry keeps dropping. Early models cost around $500. You can now buy a pair for under $100.

Privacy advocates wanted certainty. What they got is a patchwork, one rule at the council pool, another at the shopping centre, and nothing at all everywhere else. If you are worried about being filmed in a change room or public toilet, the answer for now is to ask the venue what its policy actually is, because Canberra isn't going to tell you.