What is 'About this image' feature, the Google tool that helps you identify fake photos

This feature helps people quickly and easily assess context, credibility of images

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Technology hasn't made it easy! Deepfake, fake stories, misinformation, and AI-generated images have made it increasingly difficult for an internet user to know if the image or video one is watching is fake, doctored, manipulated, or real. It is this Gordian knot that Google seeks to solve with its new feature 'About this image'.

Cory Dunton Google product manager, search, in a recent blog post announced the launch of the tool.

Citing a 2022 Poynter study which said 62 per cent of people believe they come across misinformation daily or weekly, he said this is why Google continues to build easy-to-use tools and features on Google Search to help users spot misinformation online, quickly evaluate content, and better understand the context of what they are seeing.

"But we also know that it’s equally important to evaluate visual content that you come across. That’s why we’re expanding our ongoing work in information literacy to include more visual literacy and help people quickly and easily assess the context and credibility of images. In the coming months, we’re launching a new tool called About this image," the blog post read.

The feature, which will be first made available in the US in English, will help users to find important aspects of a photo they come across. These include when the image in question and similar images were first indexed by Google, where it may have first appeared, and where else it has been seen online.

With this background information on an image, you can get a better understanding of whether an image is reliable — or if you need to take a second look, he wrote.

Users will be able to find this tool by clicking on the three dots on an image in Google Images results, searching with an image or screenshot in Google Lens, or by swiping up in the Google App when you are on a page and come across an image you want to learn more about.

Later this year, Google users will also be able to use it by right-clicking or long-pressing on an image in Chrome on desktop and mobile.

"...we're also announcing that as we begin to roll out generative image capabilities, we will ensure that every one of our AI-generated images has a markup in the original file to give you context if you come across it outside of our platforms. Creators and publishers will be able to add similar markups, so you’ll be able to see a label in images in Google Search, marking them as AI-generated. You can expect to see these from several publishers including Midjourney, Shutterstock, and others in the coming months," Dunton wrote.

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