{"slug": "google-earth-goes-nano-bananas", "title": "Google Earth Goes Nano Bananas", "summary": "Google announced that its AI image generation model, Nano Banana 2, can now be used to create custom images and 3D renderings inside Google Earth, but the feature is drawing criticism from digital investigator Henk van Ess, who warns that realistic AI-generated images in the satellite imagery layer could be weaponized to undermine truth. Van Ess demonstrated that Google's safeguards did not prevent him from creating harmful images, and he argues the tool makes it far easier to falsify satellite imagery.", "body_md": "It’s been possible to use 3D models in Google Earth for decades. But [Google’s announcement yesterday](https://blog.google/products-and-platforms/products/earth/nano-banana-google-earth-image-generation/) its AI image generation model, [Nano Banana 2](https://blog.google/innovation-and-ai/technology/ai/nano-banana-2/), can be used to create custom images and 3D rendering inside Google Earth is getting some pushback, and not necessarily just because it’s AI.\n\n[Henk van Ess is concerned](https://www.digitaldigging.org/p/how-to-plant-a-nuclear-plant-in-iran) that realistic AI-generated images in the context of Google’s satellite imagery layer will be weaponized in a way that undermines our ability to determine the truth.\n\nGoogle spent twenty years building the reference the world checks against. Today it added a button that makes things up. […]\n\nGoogle’s own description of the “fun feature” is that Nano Banana “creates concepts grounded in the real world.”\n\nGrounded in the real world means the invented thing is welded to genuine coordinates, drawn on genuine imagery, often in the same colours and the same light and at the same angle as the picture beside it. […]\n\nA government official wants a strike to look bigger than it was. A faction wants a hospital to look flattened, or intact, depending which one is holding it this week. A troll wants forty thousand reposts before lunch.\n\nThis morning all three needed a screenshot, a second browser tab and a little patience. Tonight they need a sentence.\n\nVan Ess’s point is that while it has always been possible to falsify satellite imagery, it just got a *lot* easier. He also discovered that Google’s safeguards against creating images on harmful topics did not prevent him from doing so.", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/google-earth-goes-nano-bananas", "canonical_source": "https://www.maproomblog.com/2026/07/google-earth-goes-nano-bananas/", "published_at": "2026-07-31 17:54:35+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-07-31 18:10:31.596897+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["generative-ai", "ai-ethics", "ai-products"], "entities": ["Google", "Nano Banana 2", "Henk van Ess", "Google Earth"], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/google-earth-goes-nano-bananas", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/google-earth-goes-nano-bananas.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/google-earth-goes-nano-bananas.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/google-earth-goes-nano-bananas.jsonld"}}