What do AI's say about you? The new frontier of digital reputation has already begun.

New technologies are redefining how we interact with information and build perceptions online. According to Renan Bulgueroni, CEO of Hawkz, a company specializing in digital reputation in Brazil and Spain, the way reputations are built and perceived on the web is undergoing a significant change, particularly with the rise of generative artificial intelligence, voice assistants, and increasingly intelligent search engines.

Digital reputation – previously limited to what appeared on the first few pages of Google – is now processed, interpreted, and delivered in real time by conversational algorithms, directly to your living room, car, or even your watch.

These technologies not only shape our perception, but also respond to the essence of human behavior: seeking security, meaning, and clarity in relationships. If we previously used Google like a modern oracle, today the oracle responds in real time, with context and natural language," Renan Bulgueroni assesses.

The Neuroscience Behind "Googling"

What appears to be a custom shaped by modernity, in fact—according to the expert—is an ancestral behavior with neuroscientific roots. The pursuit of predictability and security, combined with the ease of digital searches, has become an essential filter in personal and professional decisions.

Facing the high competitiveness of the market, users seek more reliable decisions, and research helps validate perceptions and avoid surprises, whether when looking for a doctor, lawyer, company, or person to connect with. Everyone wants to be sure they are choosing the best option, and digital reputation becomes a confirmation tool.

LinkedIn, for example, shows only what the candidate wants to display. Google, however, shows everything: lawsuits, social media, mentions, news articles. The search has become an essential part of this screening process for company HR departments. This behavior is also applicable to social life. After meeting someone, it's common to quickly search for their name," Bulgueroni concludes.

From typing to voice commands

According to a forecast released by Gartner, by 2026, the use of traditional search engines could decrease by up to 25%, being progressively replaced by artificial intelligence agents, fueled by voice assistants and chatbots.

According to Renan, this projection should be interpreted cautiously, as the actual impact will depend on the rate of adoption by users and the ability of major platforms to reinvent their search experiences—as is the case with Google, which is already moving in this direction with the AI Overview system, which provides answers in the first result based on generative AI.

The new reputation ecosystem

Siri, Alexa, and Google Assistant are undergoing reinvention. Previously limited, they now feature integration with generative AI.

– Siri is being redesigned with AI (Apple Intelligence project).
– Alexa is being integrated with more powerful LLMs, such as Claude and proprietary models.
– Google Assistant is already merging with Gemini.

This new ecosystem connects in the following way:

1. Voice command →
2. Generative AI →
3. Search mechanism →
4. Contextualized response

This is the new flow:

1. The voice assistant receives the command (e.g., "Search about so-and-so").
2. He activates an AI model (GPT-4, Gemini, etc.).
3. The model searches web sources (Google, Bing).
4. The AI interprets and responds based on context and relevance.

After detailing the new dynamics, the CEO indicates that these integrations show that ensuring a good digital reputation isn't enough to simply "be good" on Google. It's necessary to manage your online presence as a strategic asset – because now it will be read and interpreted by conversational algorithms, as well as consulted in metasearch engines.

Minimum effort, maximum reward.

From a behavioral and neuroscientific perspective, the less effort required to obtain information, the greater the chance of the behavior repeating—this is how humans form habits. Therefore, automatic behavior focuses precisely on this ease of searching for and finding information about someone.

Previously, you needed to go to a computer, then to a phone. Now, you just need to speak — and the answer comes packaged in natural language. The image of people and businesses is being read, interpreted, and distributed by robots, on a large scale, based on what they find (or don't find). Reputation isn't just a reflection of who you are; it's the perception algorithms have of you," he concludes.