The volume of information we consume and the speed at which we encounter it can feel daunting, especially as technology rapidly evolves. Evaluating the trustworthiness of information we see online has never been so important.
As generative AI tools become more accessible and widespread, questions about people’s ability to determine the trustworthiness of content they see online have become more prevalent and urgent. In this paper, we explain how Google helps people make informed decisions about what to trust online through two complementary levers: context and provenance. Context helps people understand where a piece of information came from, how it is being used and what other sources say about it. Provenance provides information about how content was created or edited.
Both context and provenance help people make informed decisions about what to trust online. Accordingly, we invest in a holistic approach, comprising assertive provenance tools, in-product context tools, and off-platform investment in information literacy capacity building programs.
Working with schools and educational organizations around the world as they prepare for the future of learning, we found that the most frequent concerns from educators centered around the challenge of discerning trustworthy information.
Educators and librarians have long helped students and members of the public find, evaluate, and understand information effectively through new media and technological advancements. While fact checking organizations, journalists and information literacy experts have also developed effective practices to discern the trustworthiness of information, many people feel unequipped to use them when needed. According to the Reuters Institute’s Digital News Report 2026, 62% of respondents globally said they were concerned about what is real or fake in online news.
“Is this AI-generated?” is not equivalent to “Is this trustworthy?” An image may not be AI-generated yet still be taken out of context or manipulated with photo-editing software. There are other, broader credibility questions about its context and its provenance that should be asked, such as: Is this image being used in the right context? Where did this information come from? Has it been edited? What is the perspective or incentive of the person who is sharing it? Is there a bigger picture to consider? And even with this information, answering “Is this true?” can still be complicated.
People come to Google to learn more about things they see elsewhere, maybe in a text message from a family member or something shared on social media. Our approach to helping them is two-fold. First, we build our products with quality in mind, designing them to surface reliable information where it is available. Second, we provide intuitive in-product features that help people explore the question “Can I trust this?” for themselves.
We develop these tools with input from information literacy experts and the people who use our products. Academic research, including studies discussed in this paper and practices developed in the field, help us understand what works and where we need to improve. These insights guide how we build tools that support people’s own information literacy skills.
Our work in this space is far from done. As technology changes, approaches that work today will need to evolve, and technical solutions alone will not be enough. We’re committed to working with our users, partners, experts, and all those interested in helping make it easier to decide what to trust online. We welcome the discussions that may be sparked by this paper as we continue to improve our approach.