Alphabet-owned Google will increase access to its SynthID tool to make it easier for users to identify content created with or enhanced by AI.
Google chief executive Sundar Pichai said that SynthID, introduced in 2023 within the company’s Gemini AI app, would soon be available in the company’s generic search feature and the Chrome browser.
SynthID, according to Google, acts as an invisible watermark designed to make it easier to identify photos, videos and audio created with or edited by AI tools. A 2023 Google statement said the tool was to help “foster transparency and trust in generative AI".
Mr Pichai made the announcement on Monday at Google’s annual I/O conference in California.
“We’re now going a step further and adding content credentials verification across products,” he said, referring to SynthID. “This will show you if the origin of the content was AI or a camera, and if it has been edited using generative AI tools.”
Mr Pichai displayed a widely circulated AI-generated photograph on the large presentation screen that appeared to show him, Tesla’s Elon Musk, Nvidia’s Jensen Huang and OpenAI’s Sam Altman sitting in a parking lot and eating McDonald's to illustrate his point about SynthID.
“It’s obviously fake. I don’t eat hamburgers,” he joked. “But it might not be as clear to everyone else. That’s where these tools can be useful.”
Mr Pichai also said that it would be crucial for other AI and technology companies to implement the company’s SynthID standards to make it more useful for users.
He said OpenAI, Kakao and ElevenLabs had agreed to “adopt SynthID too”, in addition to Nvidia, which signed on last year.
“It’s great to see the cross-industry collaboration and we’re looking forward to expanding to more partners and setting the standard for transparency for the AI era,” he said.
Mr Pichai said that so far at least 100 billion images, videos and audio files had been watermarked using SynthID.
