Google Earth's New AI Image Tool Is Already Fooling Fake-Photo Detectors

Key points

• Google launched Nano Banana 2, an AI image-generation feature inside Google Earth, globally on the web version earlier this week.
• Researcher Henk van Ess of Digital Digging used it to create fake satellite images showing refugees near the US-Mexico border and a bomb crater beside a hospital in Gaza.
• Google says every image the tool creates carries a SynthID digital watermark, an invisible tag embedded in the image to identify it as AI-generated.
• Digital Digging fooled Hive, a commercial AI-detection service, using an AI-altered video produced with the same Google Earth feature.

Google Earth has a new trick. Type a text prompt, a written instruction, and the platform's Nano Banana 2 feature generates a fake satellite image layered on top of real aerial and 3D map data. Google pitched it as a way to visualise historical sites or preview real estate projects. Within days, a researcher had already used it to make fake crisis images.

What did the researcher actually make?

Henk van Ess, an open-source intelligence researcher at Digital Digging, created two images that look like genuine satellite footage: one showing refugees gathered near the Mexican border, another showing a bomb crater next to a hospital in Gaza. Neither scene was real. Both looked plausible at a glance.

That's the risk. Some outputs are obviously fake, like a Sphinx-Statue of Liberty hybrid. But the tool can produce images convincing enough to share on social media before anyone checks.

Does Google's watermark fix the problem?

Not entirely. Google told The Verge AI that every Nano Banana 2 image includes a SynthID watermark, the same invisible signature Google uses across its other AI image tools. You can check a suspicious image through the Gemini app (Google's AI assistant) or Google Lens in Search.

Watermarks can be missed or worked around, though. We reported on 29 July 2026 that SynthID's reach raises its own questions even at scale, and this week's test confirms detection isn't automatic: Hive, a well-known AI content detection service, didn't flag an AI-altered Google Earth video as artificial.

What should you do if you see a satellite image online?

Treat satellite imagery in news stories or social posts the way you'd treat an unverified eyewitness photo. Van Ess recommends cross-checking suspicious images against independent platforms such as Sentinel-2 or Landsat, both publicly accessible. He also suggests checking orbital metadata, the technical record of when an image was taken and by which satellite, to see whether the numbers add up.

For a quick first check, paste the image into Google Lens or use "@verifyai" inside the Gemini app.

Satellite imagery carries unusual authority. A street photo can be staged; a satellite view feels like proof from orbit. Nano Banana 2 breaks that assumption, and the misinformation risk won't wait for detection tools to catch up.