Multinational tech firm Google appears to have integrated the Ethereum Name Service (ENS) for the results on its search engine. The crypto address data appears to be sourced from Etherscan, an Ethereum block explorer.
An initial investigation conducted by crypto news and research platform CryptoSlate confirmed the integration. According to the tests done, several ENS addresses, including Vitalik.eth, which belongs to Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin.
The search results displayed address details such as the Ethereum balance and the timestamp of the last transaction, with data collected from Etherscan.
At the time of writing, no official statement from ENS has been published, although Brantly Millegan, a former member of the ENS development team, shared his discovery of the integration on X.
holy fucking shit google has integrated ENS into its search 🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯 pic.twitter.com/xZt00EdJoq
— brantly.eth (@BrantlyMillegan) March 21, 2024
Google has been involved in crypto for some time now. A previous update from Google enabled users to check Ethereum address balances directly through the search engine. During the days leading to the Ethereum Merge event in September 2022, a countdown timer was uploaded by Google to help track the update whenever a user searches for “Ethereum” or “Ethereum Merge”
Despite Google’s previous forays into crypto, it includes significant investments in crypto firms such as Dapper Labs through GV (Google Ventures), its financial arm. According to data from CryptoRank, GV also has investments in Web3 platform and BAYC creator Yuga Labs, decentralized wireless network Helium, and Bitcoin infrastructure provider Voltage, among others.
With these incursions into crypto, Google also revised its advertising policy for crypto late last year to include “Cryptocurrency Coin Trusts,” allowing investors to trade shares in trusts holding digital assets. As a result, Bitcoin ETF products from prominent asset managers like BlackRock now appear in search results for related queries.
News of the Google ENS feature has positively impacted the ENS token, which gained around 6% in the 24 hours following the announcement, trading at $21.56 at the time of writing. The ENS project has recently achieved significant milestones, including becoming fully decentralized and securing a partnership with domain registrar GoDaddy to link traditional DNS with Ethereum names.
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