Did Google Clean Up Its Sexy Search Suggestions? See Google Images' X-Rated Alphabet Before And After

Google wants to help us shave seconds off our searches, but not necessarily if you're looking for something X-rated.

The search engine has recently come under scrutiny for censoring the autocomplete suggestions offered by its Google Instant feature. In order to ensure users wouldn't be shown any "pornography, violence, [or] hate speech," the search engine blacklisted certain terms. Typing in the innocuous term "car rental" will offer up a list of suggested search terms and search results, but the blacklisted terms "bisexual" or "cocaine," for example, will "turn off" Google Instant, so no suggestions or results are displayed (See the strangest terms blacklisted by Google Instant). Of course, you can still search for the blacklisted terms (just type in the query and hit enter), but Google Instant isn't activated.

Now it seems Google may have cleaned up Google Images, as well, weeding out the racier autocomplete suggestions.

Search Engine Land's Danny Sullivan pointed out last week that the suggested search terms returned by Google Images were not always G-rated. "Over on Google Images, some of the suggestions that appear as you type are more of the soft-porn variety," Sullivan noted. Typing in "g" returned autocomplete suggestions like "girls breast feeding each other."

But Google Images' X-rated alphabet appears to have been tweaked up in the days since then. In the slideshow below, we've included screenshots of the suggestions offered by Google Images on October 19, versus those displayed on October 25. The ones taken at a later date are far more mundane, with search suggestions like "Zac Efron nasty pictures" or "Shakira no clothes" nowhere to be found.

UPDATE: A Google spokesperson told The Huffington Post: "We take an algorithmic approach to exclude a narrow class of search queries related to pornography, violence and hate speech. This system is neither perfect nor instantaneous, and we continue to make updates and improvements."

Should Google Images have censored its autocomplete suggestions or is the search giant going too far? Weigh in below.

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October 19

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Comments

[Waveskiboy]

07:25 AM on 10/27/2010

To hell with Google!

[Tyler-Durden]

09:08 AM on 10/26/2010

there is nothing wrong with this. it's like the store still carries the product, they just don't have the clerk hand-walk you to it.

I THINK we should separate all the porn into its own internet. ISPs can provide two products: one regular internet and one adult internet. If you don't want porn, you don't subscribe to that service. Then it's not even piped into your house. Business that provide wi-fi may also be interested in providing a "clean" product.

why not?

[JasonMcl]

06:38 AM on 10/27/2010

Excellent example Mr. Durden.

[Allen Bouchard]

12:38 PM on 10/28/2010

No thanks, I think should keep Net Neutrality.

[Tyler-Durden]

05:45 PM on 11/04/2010

Allen, "net neutrality" refers to the content available on the internet being censored, restricted, or manipulated by the ISPs that provide access.

it's NOT about what a website chooses to display on their site. We don't buy our access from Google.

it's a big difference. Google has a right to determine what shows up on their site. But Comcast (for example) does NOT have a right to determine what sites you can access on your browser.

see what i mean?

[Don Giovanni]

08:06 AM on 10/26/2010

How frustrating, now you have to think of your own pornographic searches. LOL!

[GrownupStewie]

04:31 AM on 10/26/2010

zac efron nasty pictures......LMAO

[NonConforming]

04:06 AM on 10/26/2010

This article was written either by a pervert-alarmist or by a ACLU member.

[SrAN]

02:12 AM on 10/26/2010

Google is not a public entity or part of a government run program (or is it...cue the conspiracy music). Instead it is private domain that offers a free service.

They need to realize that not everyone who goes on the internet is looking for porn and that some have small children who use the computer for school research or to learn (I have a young cousin who used the computer to help her learn her ABC's through an internet site). They don't need to be seeing stupid quotes like Girl without any clothes Hannah Montana without a top. Google is at least being sensitive to those issues which you have to respect. And honestly if you need porn that bad just type in whatever you need, I betcha you will find it.

But Google, one request, dont make chicken breast recipes or online shopping for bras and other underwear so hard to get to, that type of censorship is just ridiculous.

[VegetableMan]

04:00 PM on 10/27/2010

so some censorship is good, but when it affects you, it's bad?

[SrAN]

09:38 AM on 10/28/2010

some censorship is good, especially if you have the choice of turning it on or off depending on your household. The last line just meant that there is a line and when you are looking for chicken breast recipes but get censored, that to me is just a bit too much.

[Mark Philmore]

10:50 PM on 10/25/2010

The censorship is pretty pathetic. Even with safe search off. Try looking for the very innocuous song "what's new pussycat" by Tom Jones, and you run into problems. I see they've fixed the problem of looking for chicken breast recipes. But don't go looking for any cock and bull stories. I guess you're supposed to be looking for rooster and adult male bovine stories.

[ElvisGump]

10:37 PM on 10/25/2010

Well there goes a favorite pastime of typing an innocent word and see how many naughty auto-completes Google would return.

Of course I just got a good laugh from Two and A Half men tonight from http:///www.malibupuddinggirls.com Don't say I didn't warn you sick pupppies...

[Steelsil]

10:09 PM on 10/25/2010

Seems appropriate to me.

[liberalbug]

09:31 PM on 10/25/2010

Ok, so your porn searches don't autocomplete?. Type 'em out. Hint, you can type faster with two hands.

[Yoda]

09:30 PM on 10/25/2010

I am not sure if Google or H uffPost is the one that practice censorship more rigidly?

[speakingtruth2power]

10:40 PM on 10/25/2010

HP2PC!

[MTGradwell]

08:47 PM on 10/25/2010

Let me get this straight: If you aren't being constantly subjected to a barrage of pornography that you never requested and do not want, then that is censorship, and reprehensible. Anyone searching for info on the Penistone Lighthouse, for instance, MUST be subjected to wall-to-wall male sexual organs and/or descriptions thereof. It doesn't matter if the person searching is a minor. 24/7 unexpected sex education is good at any age; and it must run the entire gamut, not just the things you'r into but also the things that make you cringe. Plus the things that would make absolutely anyone cringe. Anything less and we'd be worse than China.

Well, then, it follows that the Internet has ALWAYS been censored. Even from the start, Google instant didn't show everything that it could have, although more slipped through then than does now. And every other search engine, without exception, has been a model of Stalinist repression from the day it began onwards. It's not just a Google thing - in fact, Google is the only search engine where the censorship isn't total.

It isn't even an Internet thing. If everyone you meet as you walk down the high street doesn't thrust their bits at you from unexpected directions in the most lascivious way they can manage, then the high street is censored just as shockingly as the Internet is.

[liberalbug]

09:30 PM on 10/25/2010

There's really a Penisstone light house? Now that's hilarious.

[JasonMcl]

11:03 PM on 10/25/2010

Excellent example!

And by contrast if you use the right words in the right situation you have a chance of uncensoring any girl you happen to meet on the street :D

[JasonMcl]

07:34 PM on 10/25/2010

Q: If Google is censoring everything why can you still look up anything you want on Google?
A: They aren't censoring anything.

[BlueHorde]

07:11 PM on 10/25/2010

Gee whiz. I can't find the scandal in this.
Google is not a public utility, it is a business that offers a service for free. People choose it because it works well and easily gives people useful search results, that means more eyeballs for the ads that makes money for Google. All they are doing is trying to give more people more useful results. Most people don't really want porn intruding on their non-porn searches, and for those looking for porn, Google is still just as easy as it ever was.

[bejayech]

06:43 PM on 10/25/2010

Still confused about how they can come "under fire" for not doing everything possible to lead people to pornography, violence, or hate speech. Who exactly is the crowd that finds this practice so objectionable?