This cute new personal assistant can help run your life — if you let it access your personal data

Over the years, Meta became an open-weight AI giant on the back of Llama, its large language model that powers Meta AI in Instagram, WhatsApp, and Facebook. Now, the company is throwing it all away in favor of a new closed-source solutions. This time, it is tapping into nostalgia to win the hearts and minds of users with an upcoming agentic device that looks a lot like the Tamagotchi of yore.

When talking about frontier AI models, ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and Grok take up most of the air in the room. However, on the open-weight side, Meta’s Llama is quite popular, with 2.4 billion downloads as of early 2026. Despite its notable lead in a category increasingly flooded by Chinese competitors, Meta is opting to throw out its progress in favor of a new AI platform called Muse Spark.

You’re essentially using someone else’s computer to carry out tasks and store your data.

Introduced earlier this year, Muse Spark is a multimodal system aimed at achieving “personal superintelligence.” Meta calls it a “ground-up overhaul of our AI efforts,” claiming that it is on par with the latest Llama 4 Maverick model while using far less compute. In other words, it’s equally powerful, yet more efficient.

Muse Spark isn’t the story, though. It’s merely the backbone to Meta’s new service, unveiled in early September. The company’s first consumer-facing AI agent, simply called Muse, is designed to carry out tasks on behalf of the next billion users. It runs inside Muse Secure VM, a virtual machine that contains Muse itself and a user’s personal data.

This way, Muse never takes full control of the user’s main device. Instead, it operates within a dedicated silo to complete assigned tasks, like browsing the web, filling out forms, and even shopping online. The virtual machine also lets Muse work, even if you close the app or shut off your device.

For the security-conscious, Muse Secure VM runs entirely on Meta’s cloud servers. That means you are essentially using someone else’s computer to carry out tasks and store your data. Furthermore, interactions are unencrypted, so Meta can technically peek at your conversations, both for safety evaluations and AI training purposes. This will change later this year, when Meta introduces Muse Confidential VM as another virtual machine option with full encryption, but for now, your conversations are accessible.

On the bright side, Meta claims that it won’t share your data strictly with its ad team, and all passwords, payment info, and other personal data are saved inside a secure storage system that Muse can’t see itself.

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Joel Carillet/Getty Images

Right now, Muse lives within an app on iPhone and Android. You can also find it on the web at muse.ai. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg is betting that you’ll want a dedicated device instead. On stage at Meta Connect, he unveiled Muse Charm, a handheld gadget with Muse contained inside. At first glance, it looks like a Tamagotchi pet from the late 1990s. Look closer, and you’ll find Muse’s customizable mascot, Jollybot, on the display. You can give it a name, swap out its outfits, and change its voice.

The device is designed to clip on a keychain and go wherever you go so that it’s always accessible. Place your finger on the fingerprint sensor on the side to summon Muse, and put it to work. Zuckerberg noted that Muse Charm is one of the easiest ways to access the agent, as if pulling out a phone and opening the Muse app is an arduous task in comparison.

Muse Charm devices are expected to launch in December this year. That said, Meta has a steep road ahead. So far, dedicated AI devices like the Humane AI Pin and Rabbit R1 have flopped spectacularly. Consumers don’t want separate AI-powered hardware when their existing smartphones already do the same things without extra money or hassle.

Muse Charm actually competes in that sense with the Muse app, already widely available and growing fast, with 5 million downloads so far. Users don't need this device, but Meta is betting millions will want to buy it anyway.

Then there are the privacy concerns, recently aroused by data-grabbing and mass-surveillance implications of the company's Ray-Ban glasses. Meta hasn't locked in consumer trust when it comes to devices, and Muse represents a substantial expansion of its powers.

Blaze News contacted Meta to address several privacy concerns, particularly around Muse’s lack of encryption and whether or not Muse Confidential VM will be a freely accessible solution in the future. A spokesperson responded by pointing us toward a quote on Meta’s developer blog:

Today’s Muse architecture isolates each user’s data from each other and keeps it secure. It restricts access to your data by Meta personnel through operational policies. It does not prevent Meta from accessing data when necessary to support, secure, or operate the service.

That last line confirms our suspicions — Meta can access Muse data if it deems necessary, with necessity open to interpretation. As for Confidential VM, they have no further details to share at this time, but if you are interested in using Meta Muse, your data will be most secure if you wait for the fully encrypted version later this year.

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