Meta's Free AI Orders Your Breakfast — and Wants Your Bank Data

Meta has a new free AI assistant called Muse, and it's already a hit — more than 900,000 downloads in its first week. Think of it as a helper that lives inside apps you already use, like WhatsApp and Instagram. Instead of typing questions into a chatbot, you text it tasks like you would a friend. It replies with a thumbs-up emoji and quietly does the work in the background.

When it comes to actually getting things done, Muse is genuinely impressive. A WIRED reviewer asked it to order breakfast from a local bakery, and Muse went to the bakery's website, added a biscuit sandwich to the cart, and even asked for extra cheese in a note to the kitchen. It found cheap used couches on Facebook Marketplace and offered to message the sellers. Unlike earlier AI tools that stumbled around websites, Muse rarely gets lost when browsing for you.

Here's the catch: Muse is hungry for your data. Under its "ideas" tab, it kept suggesting the reviewer connect more accounts. When the reviewer mentioned saving for a vacation, Muse offered to link directly to their checking and savings accounts so it could track real balances. It also keeps a "Memory" file of your preferences and habits. You can edit that file or ask Muse to erase it, but there's no simple button to turn memory off entirely.

Meta insists the tool was built with user control in mind. But one expert summed up the real trade-off: when you talk to an AI, you're really talking to the company hosting it. In other words, the convenience is real — so is the cost of handing a giant advertising company a front-row seat to your daily life, purchases, and finances.