US presidential elections 2024: YouTube, Search, and AI get safeguards as Google boosts security measures

Google

Ahead of the US presidential elections in November, Google has introduced new safety measures and tools.

“We’re proud that our platforms are used by people and campaigns of every background and belief, and that we've built tools to keep campaigns secure online,” said Laurie Richardson, Google’s vice president, trust and safety.

In a blog post, she said that here have been dozens of elections around the world this year from India to the European Union to Mexico, where Google has done similar work.

New feature in Search

Google is rolling out a new feature on Search that helps people across the US to find authoritative information on how they can register to vote. “When you search for information on the voter registration process in your state, you'll soon be able to find aggregated resources and information from state election offices,” said Richardson.

Candidate details in YouTube videos

In YouTube, when users search for federal election candidates, an information panel may appear above the search results, highlighting candidate details, such as their political party, and a link to Google Search. There may also be a link to the candidate’s official channel. Google will also show reminders on where and how to vote on the YouTube homepage.

Tackling AI-generated images, videos

Google said that it is continuing to bring SynthID — embedded watermarking — to additional Google Gen AI tools for content creation and more forms of media including text, audio, visual and video. “For instance, images generated by Gemini, including with our most recent Imagen 3 model, are embedded with SynthID watermarks,” noted Richardson. Advertisers to disclose when an ad or video includes synthetic content that does not authentically depict real or realistic-looking people or events.