Google summaries lose in Germany
2026-06-10 17:08:03.644675+02 by Dan Lyke 0 comments
From tante @tante@tldr.nettime.org and Peter Rojas @roj.as:Landmark German ruling declares Google's AI Overviews are Google's own words and makes it liable for false answers
Google's AI overviews had falsely tied two publishing companies to scams, subscription traps, and shady business practices for certain search queries. According to the court, the AI mixed up information about other, genuinely sketchy companies with the plaintiffs and drew connections that didn't appear in any of the linked sources. The publishers sent Google a cease-and-desist letter, but Google didn't respond appropriately.
Google's defense was that users could check the linked sources themselves. The Decoder notes that Pew finds that only 1% of users click a source link from Google's AI overviews. Oumi’s Study Finds 50% of AI Overviews Untrustworthy:
Of the AI Overviews powered by Gemini 3 we were able to assess, about 91% contained the correct answer. Only 39% of the total overviews were both correct and fully supported by its cited sources, a combination we term “trustworthy.”
David Chisnall (*Now with 50% more sarcasm!*) @david_chisnall@infosec.exchange observes:
Google's defence needs to be amplified by anyone talking to politicians about 'AI' regulation:
Google is explicitly saying in their legal filing that the outputs from their LLM should not be trusted and that users should know that.
That's one hell of an admission. Imagine saying that about any other category of product.
That also feels remarkably similar to Fox News's defense in libel cases. Chisnall also notes:
The bit I suspect will have much more impact longer term is one of the defences entered by Google's lawyers. Somewhat more verbose in the original German, but it boiled down to: Everyone knows LLMs produce nonsense, no one should ever trust the output of an LLM in any situation that matters, it's not Google's fault if people read the output of an LLM and believed it might have some connection to reality.
It's debatable whether everyone knows that, but this is now an official statement entered into the court record that at least one of the major LLM vendors knows this. And that's now an on-the-record statement made under penalty of perjury that can be entered as evidence in any court case against companies selling LLM- integrated tooling.