‘Irresponsible’: Google rolls back new satellite image AI tool after backlash

WASHINGTON - Google rolled back on July 31 a new feature allowing Google Earth users to generate AI visualisations on top of the service’s satellite imagery, following a furious backlash from researchers and open-source intelligence experts about the potential for disinformation.

“We’ve seen geospatial professionals using this feature for a range of useful purposes. However, we’ve also seen people sharing screenshots of generated imagery that appear to violate our policies,” a Google spokesperson said in a statement to AFP. “So we’re rolling back this feature in Google Earth while we work on implementing stronger guardrails.”

“We know that people uniquely trust Google Earth for a reliable view of the world,” the statement added.

The “create image” tool, unveiled on July 30, had integrated Google’s Nano Banana 2 image-generation technology into Google Earth, letting users zoom into locations and build pictures in seconds based on the program’s satellite, aerial and 3D-mapping data.

Google had described it as a way to “visualise history, create real estate plans and more.”

But disinformation researchers warned that it could enable bad actors to misuse Google Earth – a key resource for fact-checking and verification – to create realistic geospatial fakes.

“Google spent 20 years building the reference the world checks against,” digital investigations expert Henk Van Ess wrote in one widely shared post on Substack. “Today, it added a button that makes things up.”

Brady Africk, a research analyst at the American Enterprise Institute specialising in satellite imagery analysis, told AFP the Google Earth update would have made it “easier to generate convincing fake satellite imagery that can spread quickly online and mislead the public.”

Such fakes “erode public trust in satellite imagery, and make the jobs of journalists and researchers more difficult,” he said.

‘Irrevocably damaged overnight’

As the critiques piled up, Google had said on X that the images created with the feature included SynthID digital watermarks, invisible markers embedded in media generated using the company’s artificial intelligence tools.

“We take misinformation seriously,” the company wrote, linking to an AI policy that instructs users against “misinformation, misrepresentation or misleading activities.”

AFP’s tests of the feature on July 31 were able to fabricate satellite images that could have had serious global consequences: an explosion in Paris, a nuclear site in Iran, a bomb crater in Russia and an Islamic State group training ground in Syria.

The tool also fulfilled prompts to visualise other fake scenes, including floods across Bangladesh, a migrant caravan camped at the US-Mexico border and a suspicious warehouse holding vans in Georgia – one of several states US President Donald Trump has falsely accused of widespread election fraud.

The “create image” button no longer appeared within Google Earth after Google paused its use.

Similar fakes have previously had real-world impacts. In 2023, an AI image depicting an explosion at the Pentagon briefly rattled the markets.

Early in the US war with Iran, an AI-altered satellite image depicting a destroyed US military base garnered millions of views across platforms.

Among the groups that called for Google to reverse its decision was the London-based Centre for Information Resilience, whose executive director Ross Burley told AFP the feature was “irresponsible.”

“Trust in satellite imagery has taken decades to build and could be irrevocably damaged overnight,” Burley said.

GeoConfirmed, a volunteer-driven open-source intelligence project that verifies visuals from conflicts around the globe, had also urged Google to reconsider.

“We are already observing individuals exploiting the new Google Earth web tool to make military positions, relabel buildings as schools, and experiment with manipulating the information environment,” the group wrote on X, before Google announced it was rolling back the feature.

“The primary, and perhaps only, practical use of this tool appears to be the creation and dissemination of mis- and disinformation.” AFP