I had to look this up, because I had never heard of it. How could a lens be damaged by infrared lasers?

It turns out it’s the sensors that are easily damaged by high powered lidar lasers.

https://spectrum.ieee.org/amp/keeping-lidars-from-zapping-ca...

Is there any deeper study on long term effects regarding retinal damage?

I would imagine, even with safe dosages, there would be some form of cumulative effect in terms of retinal phototoxicity.

More so if we consider the scenario that this becomes a standard COTS feature in cars and we are walking around a city centre with a fleet of hundreds of thousands of these laser sources.

I wish this was true. It'd immediately be the best way to fight surveillance systems like Flock

iPhones have had lidar for years, have cameras been affected?

Could be a gain for privacy ;-)

TIL!

Thanks! What a headache

we'd likely see new coatings and sensor designs that avoid it, not trivial but also not the end of the world

What? Please explain!