2026-09-12 / Signal #7

Google hid the blue link: search results now go through /goto

“The blue link doesn’t go anywhere you can read anymore.”

The Story

Organic Google results increasingly point at google.com/goto?url=… with an opaque blob instead of a readable destination. You only learn the real URL from the redirect’s Location header. Google framed it as anti-abuse; scrapers, rank trackers, and AI crawlers have to follow hundreds of redirects per page. SerpApi already shipped a workaround.

Why It Matters

The open web’s most famous object—the blue link—got vaulted. It’s the interface of “you may look, you may not copy,” aimed at the same AI that trained on search.

Evidence

Autom.dev (updated discussion); WebProNews 12 Sep; Search Engine Roundtable (Google comment); HN (~477 pts, ~9h).

Sources

Daily scan: 2026-09-12