This story was originally published 2020/05/18
10:05pm PDTon May 18, 2020 and last updated 2020/05/19
7:50am PDTon May 19, 2020. 

OnePlus has announced that it will temporarily disable the “color filter” camera on the 8 Pro in a future update, but only the Chinese version of the phone running HydrogenOS will be affected. The camera, which is augmented with its ability to gather infrared light, was able to see through materials like certain plastics and even some kinds of cloth. The functionality will apparently return in the future when OnePlus can limit “other functionality that may be of concern.”

The company made its initial announcement via Weibo, but a follow-up post to the OnePlus forums has made the upcoming changes much more clear. The color filter camera will be disabled in the Chinese market within the next week via a HydrogenOS update, but the company has plans to bring it back once it can eliminate customer worries. Again, this temporary feature removal only affects HydrogenOS, the company’s Chinese ROM. OnePlus has no plans to disable the color filter camera in the US or international markets, though it all markets will end up with whatever fix the company eventually devises.

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We’ve reached out to OnePlus for more details regarding this change, and we’ll be sure to update our coverage if and when we hear more.

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One of the videos claiming “X-ray”-like functionality. 

OnePlus is in a difficult position here. Although the color filter camera is mostly a gimmick and is only useful in a single camera mode, it did get enough billing for the company to advertise it as a “quad camera” system. That’s a claim that won’t be true if it’s disabled. And, though there are carefully constructed videos that show it using infrared “X-ray vision” to see through clothes, it’s actually not great at doing it in my own testing — clothes need to be very thin for it to work.

Still, I guess it’s closer to t-shirt weather every day, and better safe than sorry.


Feature will only be removed in China

OnePlus has since clarified in a forum post that the temporary feature removal will only apply to the Chinese market. The color filter camera won’t be disabled in the US and international versions of the phone.

Dear OnePlus users, friends and netizens: Regarding the issue of OnePlus 8 Pro’s “autumn” filter camera, today we would like to give you a response and account.

Recently, there have been many discussions on the Internet about the perspective capability of OnePlus’ “Autumn” filter camera, which has caused everyone’s concerns about privacy and caused trouble for OnePlus users and the majority of netizens.

When planning the filter lens of OnePlus 8 Pro, we hope to use this lens to perceive the characteristics of infrared light to provide users with a unique texture photography style effect. But recently, based on user feedback, we have found that under very specific environmental conditions, the filter lens may have a slight perspective effect on special materials at very close distances.

All the time, OnePlus has put user privacy in the most important position. In order to eliminate the impact on user privacy under possible extreme circumstances and eliminate everyone ’s concerns, we decided to temporarily disable the filter function through software upgrades. We will Push within one week.

At the same time, we also see that many OnePlus 8 Pro users like the filter function “Autumn”, and they also use this function to take a lot of very interesting landscape photos. We will use new technical solutions in the near future to eliminate After you worry about the problem, you can re-launch this filter function.

At present, there are a lot of descriptions about the perspective ability of this lens on Weibo that are not in line with the facts. We will also take up the law for the false pictures on Weibo, the guidance of malicious public opinion and the personal attacks on OnePlus users Weapons protect the rights of our brands and users.

Finally, once again apologize for the OnePlus users and the majority of netizens who have been troubled by this. We will fulfill our social responsibility as an enterprise, treat each link from product testing to user experience more rigorously, and always insist on bringing users a better experience.