The acclaimed fiddler says lawyers have reached out to him after his show was cancelled due to a Google search linking him to another person with the same last name.

Ashley MacIsaac might be pursuing legal action against Google.

On Dec. 19, the Canadian fiddler was set to play at Sipekne’katik First Nation in Nova Scotia, when organizers cancelled the show after online claims of MacIssac being convicted of internet luring and sexual assault surfaced online.

As it turns out, the claims not about the musician at all but another person in Atlantic Canada with the last name MacIsaac. The search results reportedly came from Google's AI Overview.

In an interview with The Canadian Press, the Cape Breton musician said he felt defamed by Google and would be open to suing the major search engine.

"You are being put into a less secure situation because of a media company — that's what defamation is,” he said. "If a lawyer wants to take this on (for free) ... I would stand up because I'm not the first and I'm sure I won't be the last.”

The now-corrected Google AI Overview falsely linked the Maritimes musician to a series of offences, including internet luring, assaulting a woman and attempting to assault a minor. MacIssac noted that the Google result listed him on the national sex offender registry, too, which is false.

MacIssac became aware of the false allegations about a week before he was set to take the stage. “The chief messaged back and said, ‘We can’t have you in our community...

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