News publishers protest Google’s AI-driven search changes

Google‘s expanded AI Mode in search has sparked backlash from major news publishers who claim it deprives them of traffic and revenue. This conflict highlights growing tensions between traditional media and AI-powered search innovations, as publishers discover they must opt out of search entirely to avoid having their content used in AI features—a decision Google defends as necessary for technical simplicity but publishers view as digital theft.

The big picture: News publishers are accusing Google of theft as it expands its AI Mode to all US users, replacing traditional search results with AI-generated responses.

• The News/Media Alliance, representing major US publishers, released a statement Wednesday claiming the feature “deprives” publishers of both traffic and revenue.
• Google announced the nationwide expansion of AI Mode during its I/O conference on Tuesday, adding it as a new tab within Search.

What they’re saying: News/Media Alliance CEO Danielle Coffey directly accused Google of theft in her statement condemning the expansion.

• “Links were the last redeeming quality of search that gave publishers traffic and revenue,” Coffey said. “Now Google just takes content by force and uses it with no return, the definition of theft.”
• Coffey called for Department of Justice remedies to “address this to prevent continued domination of the internet by one company.”

Behind the decision: Internal documents from Google’s antitrust trial reveal the company deliberately chose not to seek permission from publishers for AI feature inclusion.

• Publishers must opt out of search results completely if they don’t want their content used in AI features, rather than being able to selectively opt out of specific features.
• Google Search head Liz Reid testified that allowing selective feature opt-outs would add “enormous complexity” to their systems.

The technical argument: Google maintains that selective opt-outs are technically unfeasible given their search architecture.

• “By saying a publisher could be like, ‘I want to be in this feature but not that feature,’ it doesn’t work,” Reid testified. “Because then we would essentially have to say, every single feature on the page needs a different model.”