Google has started promoting google.com/goto redirect links in search results, changing external links on results pages to first redirect through Google servers before entering target websites.

This mechanism has been tested since July, with users able to see the goto parameter when hovering over search result links; third-party tools can no longer directly extract the final target address from the client-side HTML.

SEO data platform Nozzle states that this change has nearly 100% coverage in multiple residential IP provider environments, indicating that Google is moving from limited testing to large-scale deployment.

Technically, goto links use server-side redirection, making it impossible to simply parse the redirect address to restore the target URL; crawling services must request each redirect link one by one to obtain the final landing page for each result.

Each search results page typically contains a large number of links. Following server redirects one by one will significantly increase the volume of crawl requests, delays, the probability of CAPTCHA triggers, and costs for proxy IPs, particularly affecting SEO monitoring, data aggregation, and AI retrieval tools that rely on bulk extraction of search results.

Google has not directly confirmed that this measure specifically targets AI companies or search crawling, but a spokesperson confirmed that the feature is being rolled out and stated that Google has long used technical means to address evolving abuse behaviors, protecting its services and users.

From a market mechanism perspective, search ranking tracking, SERP data providers, and AI tools that rely on Google results to build search indexes will need to acquire more proxies, browser automation, and redirection parsing capabilities, leading to increased costs; Google, with its first-party search entry, retains more traffic, request control, and anti-automation pricing power. Small crawler service providers and tools that market low-cost search result collection are under pressure, while platforms that can provide compliant authorized data, direct content crawling, or multi-search engine alternatives may benefit.

Source: Public information