Google Custom Search JSON API is discontinued on January 1, 2027 #196

Hi! A heads-up about a dependency that is going away.

graphgen/models/searcher/web/google_search.py (line 12) uses Google's Custom Search JSON API (customsearch/v1). Google closed the API to new customers in January 2026 and discontinues it for everyone on January 1, 2027 (Google's overview page: "until the service discontinuation on January 1, 2027. This API is not available for new customers").

What that means in practice:

• New Google Cloud projects already get 403 PERMISSION_DENIED: This project does not have the access to Custom Search JSON API., so new users of this project can't set it up today, even with a valid key and engine ID.
• Existing keys stop working on January 1, 2027.

Options, roughly by how much code changes:

1. A CSE-compatible endpoint. Some SERP APIs serve the same customsearch/v1 request parameters and items[] response, so the change is the host and the key.
2. Another web search API with its own response format, such as Brave Search API, Tavily, Exa or a SERP API.
3. Vertex AI Search, if the engine only searched your own sites; it doesn't search the whole web.

If your engine was restricted to specific sites, a whole-web replacement can keep that with a site: operator or a site filter.

Disclosure: I work on SerpKite, one of the CSE-compatible options (https://api.serpkite.com/customsearch/v1, 1,000 free searches a month). I'm glad to send a PR for whichever option you prefer, or feel free to close this if it's already planned.