- You can now identify AI-generated images in the Gemini app
- Google uses SynthID technology to identify any AI image created using a Google app
- Google will also retain a visible watermark on all AI images created at the free and Google AI Pro tiers
AI-generated images, at least those created using Google apps, just got easier to spot. Starting today, you can upload an image you’re unsure about to the Gemini app on your mobile and simply ask, “was this image generated by Google AI?”
The technology that enables this feature is called SynthID. Google says it’s starting its rollout on images, but will soon expand to audio and video.
A release from Google says: “In addition to SynthID, we will maintain a visible watermark (Gemini sparkle) on images generated by free users and Google AI Pro users, to make images even easier to detect as Google AI generated.”
Although Google adds, “Recognizing the need for a clean visual canvas for professional work, we will remove the visible watermark from images generated by Google AI Ultra subscribers.”
Uploading the image to the Gemini app is easy. All you have to do is tap + icon at the bottom of the screen, then select either Files or Gallerydepending on where the file is located (Gallery here means Photosfor iOS users among us). After uploading the image, just type a prompt like “is this image AI generated?” and press > icon to send it.
Is it effective?
Google introduced SynthID in 2023. Since then, over 20 billion AI-generated pieces of content have been watermarked using it. When you ask Gemini if an image you uploaded was created with AI, it will check the SynthID watermark and then use its own reasoning to return an answer that gives you more context about the image.
I’ve tried using Gemini to check if an image I created using the new Nano Banana Pro was AI-generated, and it identified the invisible watermark, although the visible Gemini watermark – sparkling – in the bottom right of the image was a dead giveaway anyway.
But how does Gemini fare with non-Google AI images? Obviously, when I uploaded an image created using ChatGPT (which doesn’t use a visual watermark) to Gemini, it couldn’t find a SynthID watermark (because there isn’t one) and could only make its best guess as to whether the image was AI from visual clues. That decided it, but I didn’t feel it was very secure.
I tried it with a random image I found on the internet and it said “This image was not created with Google AI, but it is not possible to determine if it was generated with other AI tools.”
My overall impression is that Google’s efforts to help detect AI images is a step in the right direction, but until there is a digital watermarking system widely deployed by all AI image generation platforms and aimed at consumers, it remains a flawed system at best.
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