Meta launches Muse, its first major foray into AI-driven productivity tools, sparking debate over data privacy and user control amid its ability to handle routine tasks across connected apps.
Meta has launched Muse, its first serious move into AI-driven productivity, pitching the assistant as a way to “take the busywork off your plate”. According to Meta’s own product pages and reporting by Axios and AP, the tool can handle tasks such as web browsing, shopping, drafting messages, planning trips and working across connected apps. Meta says Muse runs inside a dedicated secure virtual machine and is overseen by a system called Sentinel, which is intended to limit risky actions and reduce the chance of data loss. The company has also said the assistant is available in the US and can be used through its own app or via WhatsApp.
In a hands-on review, The Verge found that Muse can perform basic practical work effectively, including clearing a Gmail inbox and buying items from Amazon after checking with the user before checkout. The assistant also offered useful prompts, such as product comparisons and subscription management, suggesting Meta wants Muse to act less like a chatbot and more like a background helper for routine admin.
But the same review showed why privacy will be Muse’s biggest hurdle. To complete tasks, the assistant needed access to email, shopping accounts and social data, and it appeared able to infer a large amount about the user from Instagram and Facebook account data. The Verge reported that Muse could surface detailed interests that were not visible in the app’s normal settings, while the assistant itself said it was drawing on API-level account data. That left the reviewer uneasy about letting the tool handle messages, purchases and other sensitive information.
Muse also appears to have uneven guardrails. The Verge said it refused some requests, including images of certain cartoon characters and an “Apple CEO”, yet it still generated Apple-branded event imagery and other realistic product mock-ups. The result is a service that seems competent at low-stakes automation, but one whose value depends on how much personal access users are willing to grant. For Meta, that trade-off may matter more than the technology itself.
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