Google fooled by AI of Over the Rainbow singer Israel Kamakawiwo’ole – would it have tricked you?
ARTIFICIAL intelligence (AI) has made it incredibly be difficult to discern the real from the fake when it comes to images.
If you're struggling to spot AI-created images, then you're not alone - Google is also having trouble telling the difference.
When Google searching Hawai'in singer Israel Kamakawiwo'ole, who covered Judy Garland's Over the Rainbow, AI-generated images appear as the top search results, according to Ethan Mollick, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School.
"It isn't just AI generated text that is starting to bleed over into search results," he wrote on X (formerly Twitter).
"The main image if you do a Google search for Hawai'ian singer Israel Kamakawiwoʻole (whose version of Somewhere Over the Rainbow you have probably heard) is a Midjourney creation right from Reddit.
"Seriously, don't trust anything you see online anymore. Faking stuff is trivial. You cannot tell the difference.
"There are no watermarks, and watermarks can be defeated easily.
"This genie is not going back in the bottle."
On the Reddit post that first posted the AI images of Kamakawiwoʻole, onlookers have asked the original poster to remove them so they aren't the first to appear under the late singer's name.
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Kamakawiwoʻole passed away in 1997 at the age of 38.
"Stop doing lame AI pictures and have some respect for the dead," one Reddit user commented.
Another wrote: "Why is this the first picture of him on Google?
"It's cool and all but don't you think he deserves a real picture of him when people look him up?"
However, Noah Giansiracusa, a professor at Bentley University, was quick to point out that the AI-generated images of Kamakawiwo'ole were easily detectable fakes if you were a true fan.
"This is really bad for society. (And WTF, he's famous for playing the ukulele, not the guitar.)," Giansiracusa wrote on X.
The problem is - you shouldn't have to be a 'true fan' to trust the images you see on Google are real.
"Google's got to up its game to keep AI shit out of the top results like this," Giansiracusa added.