In case you somehow weren't aware, there was a presidential debate last night. The internet certainly was, and, as you might expect, there was controversy after controversy as Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump went head to head in a fiery vocal bout of ranting from one of the parties.
What you may have missed is the surprising claims that Vice President Harris was "cheating" during the debate by wearing an earpiece hidden in a pair of earrings.
Allegedly, the earrings in question are the Nova H1 Audio Earring which we first saw more than a year ago at CES 2023.
The controversy is somewhat similar to a claims reported during the 2020 presidential election when President Joe Biden was accused of wearing an ear piece during the first debate between Biden and Trump. Images taken during the debate purported to show a line in his shirt that could have been a wire.
As our friends at Laptop Mag, pointed out, that conspiracy theory appeared to be a dead end. Investigated by the Reuters Fact Check team , the rumors proved to be false.
Nova H1 Audio Earrings: Who and what?
The suspicious tech Ms. Harris is accused of wearing are the Nova H1 Audio Earrings.
At first glance, the earrings look like any pair of gold-backed pearl clip-on earrings, but are actually a set of Bluetooth earpieces that produce sound around your earlobes. The sound comes micro-chambers drilled into the pearl.
To be honest, we hadn't thought about these earrings since 2023, so it was surprising to see these smart earrings getting some traction during last night's presidential debate.
The company behind the H1 earrings is a fashion-forward German startup called Icebach Sound Solutions who initially used Kickstarter to get the Nova H1 off the ground.
As far as we can tell, the H1 earrings are the only product this company ever produced and they haven't introduced any new devices since CES 2023. Their website and social media accounts are pretty quiet as well with the most recent posting from any of their socials being from May of last year.
If anyone is still working on these earrings they don't seem to be active.
Tom's Guide reached out to Nova for comment and will update if they respond.
Icebach's strange responses
From what Tom's Guide could find, it sounds like the original company behind the Nova H1 went bankrupt and was purchased by Icebach Sound Solutions.
This is based on comments we saw in the Kickstarter page. We couldn't access an update that appears to explain situation because we aren't backers. That final post was on May 31, 2023.
It's unclear if anyone actually received a set of Nova H1 earrings. At this point, it seems like the company was simply a Kickstarter scam, an unfortunate dime-a-dozen reality on the crowdfunding platform.
Icebach has responded to the controversy claiming that they have received too many media inquiries and will only give an interview to Jimmy Fallon.
"Our chosen interviewer is Jimmy Fallon, a trusted Bavarian in heart. Please refrain from any interview requests if you are not Jimmy Fallon. Thank you!" the website now reads.
The CEO Malte Iversen posted a, since deleted LinkedIn post, reposted a story on the about the claims saying, "We can neither confirm nor deny."
They seem to be leaning into the controversy which doesn't answer the question of whether or not they're actually producing these earrings. Of course, it's doubtful.
What did Vice President Kamala Harris wear?
Our friends at Laptop Mag investigated the issue and determined that more than likely, Ms. Harris was not wearing the Nova H1 audio earrings during the presidential debate.
Vice President Harris is known to regularly wear pearl earrings at events. A suspicious X user shared a comparison image of the Nova earrings being worn by Tom's Guide's own Kate Kozuch versus the earrings worn by Ms. Harris.
A style tracking blog, What Kamala Wore, has previously seen the Tiffany earrings, and the writer Susan Kelley told The Verge that Harris has been seen wearing these earrings for months.
Rumors are circulating that Kamala Harris was wearing audio earrings and being fed lines.Isn't this against the debate rules? pic.twitter.com/3sRTvp20DWSeptember 11, 2024
As you can see in the images, the earrings worn by Ms. Harris and the Nova's sported by Kozuch aren't the same at all. The Nova's have a solid back, most likely where the battery and other electronics hides while Ms. Harris' earrings have kind of an open U-shaped hook around the pearl.
As Laptop Mag found, the ones worn by Ms. Harris are more than likely a set of 18K gold South Sea Pearl Earrings, formally available as part of the Tiffany Hardwear collection .
At $695 for the gold version of the Nova H1 earrings, they weren't exactly in our earrings price range but Tiffany earrings can start at $2,000.
Icebach Sound responds to Tom's Guide
After some cheeky responses on their website and from the CEO of Icebach, Tom's Guide received a late email from Managing Director Malte Iversen.
Regarding Vice President Kamala Harris, Iversen said, "We do not know whether Mrs. Harris wore one of our products. The resemblance is striking and while our product was not specifically developed for the use at presidential debates, it is nonetheless suited for it."
They remain...irreverent.
"To ensure a level playing field for both candidates, we are currently developing a male version and will soon be able to offer it to the Trump campaign. The choice of colour is a bit challenging though as orange does not go well with a lot of colours."
Iversen went on to claim that the company is out of stock of the Nova H1 earrings and that they are allegedly in preparing a lawsuit against an unnamed Chinese company for "breaching our patents." Supposedly, they will "ramp up operations" on the basis of the lawsuit.
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