The Google search engine is becoming a fake generator. AI changes the meaning of titles
Google has started testing a new feature in its search engine that uses artificial intelligence to arbitrarily replace original article titles in search results. This phenomenon was noticed by the editors of The Verge, and Google itself officially confirmed that it is experimenting with automatically adapting headlines to user queries.
Gogle changes the titles of articles and does it without any sense
Google’s experiments were publicized by The Verge, which noted the display of headlines that were drastically different from those given by the authors. Google has confirmed an experiment in which it modifies the headlines of articles and websites using AI. The company’s representatives explain that the goal is to find a more useful title from the text.
The scale of changes made by algorithms can be surprisingly large, which is perfectly illustrated by the examples provided by The Verge. The title “I used an AI tool to cheat on everything and it didn’t help me with anything” was shortened by the search engine to the misleading form “AI tool to cheat on everything.”
Another text about the rebranding of the Copilot service – “Microsoft is changing the name of Copilot in the most typical Microsoft way” – the algorithm replaced with a completely new one, reading: “Changes in Copilot: Marketing teams are back in action.” In both cases, the titles completely differ in meaning from the content and are inconsistent with the authors’ intention.
The problem is not new. A similar mechanism for replacing content was previously tested and then implemented in the Google Discover mobile service. The American giant considered this solution a success, arguing that modifications made by artificial intelligence have a measurable impact on user satisfaction. Also, AI summaries in search results are another example of Google trying to rewrite the internet in its own way.
This is a recipe for fake news
The independent rewriting of titles by the search engine is a dangerous precedent that may negatively affect not only the online press, but the entire infosphere.
The mechanism of changing titles in this way is a recipe for fakes. All it takes is for the title incorrectly modified by AI to start circulating as a screenshot, for example on the X platform or Facebook, which is already the norm on these websites. No one will bother to access the original content, but this modified version will take on a life of its own. This type of practice is one of the mechanisms for creating disinformation on social media, and Google’s ideas raise fears that it will get even worse.
