Google’s AI is hurting publishers — buyers and agencies must speak up
Opinion
It shouldn’t just be publishers calling out the immoral practices of AI search companies. Advertisers, agencies and tech vendors all have a role to play.
The recent news that educational platform Chegg is taking Google to court over the way its AI Overview feature is diverting traffic away from its site was a watershed moment for the digital media industry.
We should all be under no illusion over what the practice amounts to: content theft. These AI search tools are scraping a publisher’s intellectual property unopposed and leveraging its data to power AI programs. Most media owners are receiving no reward for how their data is being used.
As Chegg highlighted, publishers are experiencing greatly reduced traffic to their sites, with many users getting what they need from AI Overviews. This loss of traffic hurts publisher ad revenue and undermines the reach of premium media inventory — something agencies and tech vendors also rely on.
Another impact that has been less documented is how the AI search tools are slowing page-load times and hampering fraud detection.
These AI bots are designed to index vast amounts of data, overwhelming servers with frequent and intense requests. Publishers risk having more bots visiting their sites than real humans, leading to the possibility of their traffic being flagged as fraud and the publication being removed from site lists.
Smaller publishers bear the brunt
Some well-funded publishers have secured deals with AI companies to ensure fair use of their content and payment for when it is used. The Guardian, for example, signed a strategic deal with OpenAI to integrate its journalism into the ChatGPT platform.
However, smaller, local news publishers fighting to grow their audience and build their brand names won’t have the funds or resources to negotiate a good deal with OpenAI.
Several AI tools have emerged that are designed to compensate publishers fairly via revenue-share deals when their content is used to generate AI responses. There’s also “digital toll booths” that work to charge an AI platform each time their data is scraped for AI-generated responses.
But these tools still aren’t widely used and Google’s dominance gives it a way to circumvent them. If publishers block Google’s AI search from using their intellectual property, they risk being removed from site lists — an outcome most can’t afford.
Get behind publishers
If we’re to see real change, buyers and agencies have a critical role to play.
By actively choosing to invest in premium publishers and their quality journalism, they can ensure that their media spend supports real content creators rather than unchecked automation.
Buyers and agencies also need to be pushing their ad-verification partners to do more to monitor bot-based traffic from AI search tools. When an AI large language model runs on a user’s device or network, it behaves like a human and can’t be flagged as a bot. Ad-verification experts must share any insights on this and provide potential monitoring solutions.
Regulators also have an important role to play in setting standards that create a more level playing field. The Competition & Markets Authority in the UK is doing the right thing with its investigation into Google and the impact of AI summaries.
The regulator says publishers currently have “no realistic option” but to allow Google to crawl their website and is considering limiting Google’s use of the data it harvests in response.
A rising tide lifts all boats
AI is here to stay and the technology could bring huge benefits to the digital media sector, as well as for society at large. But the way AI search companies are taking advantage of publishers and their data is unacceptable.
Speaking at a recent AI panel organised by The Digital Distillery, Rob Webster, founder of TAU Marketing Solutions, said: “The industry needs to come together to support publishers and, indeed, how our democracy functions.”
If buyers, agencies, tech vendors and regulators work together, we have the power to shape how AI impacts the industry in a positive and fair way for all.
Media companies like Chegg must have a say over how their data is used and who profits from it. That’s not just in the interests of the publishers, it’s vital for the entire digital supply chain – Google included.
Amelia Parsons is UK head of supply at ShowHeroes