Google Is Testing an Option for Websites to Opt Out of AI Search
Google is testing a new feature that allows website owners to manage their content's visibility in AI Search results. This initiative aims to provide publishers with more control and insights as Google shifts towards AI-driven search interfaces. The test is currently being conducted with a select group of publishers in the UK before a potential global rollout.
- ▪Google is testing a feature for website owners to manage their content in AI Search.
- ▪The test is currently limited to a small group of publishers in the UK.
- ▪Website owners can opt out of AI Search, which will affect their traffic and impressions.
5 outlets in our directory ran this story, first to last over 8 hours. All of the coverage we found sits in one bucket: centre. That one-sidedness is itself worth noticing.
- ▪ Google tests option to allow sites to opt out of appearing in AI search results — Google
- ▪ Publishers in UK can opt out of Google AI search results — BBC News — Tech
- ▪ Google will allow websites to exclude themselves from AI search results — Engadget
- ▪ Google will let websites opt-out of AI Mode & Overviews in Search — 9to5Google
CNET files mainly under tech. We currently carry 377 of its stories.
Story provenance
Source · retrieval · rights · ranking — open for full record
inspect →
Story provenance
Attribution is not the same as permission. This drawer separates discovery metadata, excerpts, WeSearch-generated summaries, reuse status, and whether the publisher receives the visit. Nothing here claims a legal grant the publisher has not made.
Record
| Original publisher | CNET |
| Canonical URL | https://www.cnet.com/tech/services-and-software/google-now-testing-option-website-owners-opt-out-ai/ |
| Publication time | Wed, 03 Jun 2026 13:09:39 +0000 |
| Retrieval time | 2026-06-03T13:32:07.635Z |
| Last seen | 2026-06-03T13:32:07.635Z |
| Headline source | Publisher (no WeSearch rewrite) |
| Excerpt source | publisher body |
| Excerpt method | First ~120 words (~800 chars) of extracted publisher body, fair-use limited. |
| Summary | WeSearch · cerebras-chat (WeSearch summarizer) |
| Summary source text | contentText |
| Citation coverage | Summary is a WeSearch-generated derivative; primary citation is the original publisher URL. |
| Cluster | gBZm9mG46XcK · 5 stories |
| Cluster logic | Grouped by semantic title/content similarity across sources within a rolling window. Same-publisher template collisions are excluded from coverage comparison. |
| Ranking reason | Story pages are not engagement-ranked. Hub feeds use recency, with optional source-diversified chronological ordering (cap consecutive stories per source). No personalized ranking. |
| Publisher visit | Yes — open original |
| Substitutes article? | No — link-out required for full text |
Rights status (four layers)
WeSearch handling by dimension
| Indexing | May the item be indexed (stored, ranked, made findable)? | Allowed |
| Snippet | May a short excerpt of the publisher's text be shown? | Allowed |
| AI summary | May WeSearch generate its own short summary of the article? | Limited |
| Retrieval / RAG | May the content be exposed for third-party retrieval-augmented generation? | Not asserted |
| Model training | May the content be used to train AI models? | Not asserted |
| Commercial reuse | May the content be reused commercially? | Not permitted |
Basis: Derived from the published RSS/Atom feed. Contact: [email protected]. Reviewed: 2026-07-24.
Opening excerpt (first ~120 words) tap to expand
Google is testing a new option that lets website owners manage how their content and links appear in the company's generative AI Search features, the company announced in a Keyword blog post early Wednesday morning.The test offers publishers more insight and control over how they show up in AI-powered search results as Google appears to be leaning more and more toward chatbot-like interfaces as opposed to the traditional "10 blue links" results pages. At its I/O developer conference in May, the company showed off changes like an expanded AI Mode and a search box that adjusts to fit the context of your query.This general trend toward AI-powered search has caused consternation among publishers in part out of fear that users will stay on the search page instead of venturing to the websites…
Excerpt limited to ~120 words for fair-use compliance. The full article is at CNET.
Discussion
0 commentsMore from CNET
