Tiktok announced on Wednesday that it would release Footnotes, a crowdsourcing fact-checking system similar to X and Meta's community notes functionality. The technology was initially deployed to users as a pilot program, allowing contributors to write footnotes and evaluate them on Tiktok videos.
All US Tiktok users can view notes rated as rated and submitted their ratings in return.
The company first announced plans to test footnotes in April. At the time, this feature was described as a way to provide more context to the community about Tiktok's content.
Like X's Community Notes and other similar programs, Tiktok usually uses a bridging algorithm that seeks to find consensus among people with different views. If, following this method, both parties rated the note as useful, it is more likely to be true. This is also protected against brigading, who tries to shake up decisions in their way by voting likewise.
The company says the memos will help people better understand what they are seeing on the platform by adding information and context. People who post videos of their notes may be actively trying to misrepresent the situation, but they may also miss out on other information or updates that could be useful to their audience.
Image credit: Tiktok
Tiktok began allowing users to become contributors in April as long as they were at least 18 years old and were in Tiktok for more than six months. Since then, Tiktok says users near the US have qualified as contributors to the footnotes.
Although it's new to Tiktok, the community note style feature has been around for several years.
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Twitter called the idea, originally called Bird Watch in 2020. The following year, Bird Watch Fact was officially rolled out, and in 2022 the program was expanded globally. Recently, these efforts include enabling AI to generate new and new ways of using the system to highlight popular content on the platform.
X's open source community note concept has impacted similar systems from other social media companies. Especially those trying to appease conservatives who find traditional fact-checking systems biased towards them.
Wanting to compensate the Trump administration and stop the rise in regulations, Meta dropped fact-checking this year in favor of its own community note system in the United States, raising concerns about the spread of misinformation. YouTube is also experimenting with this type of system with a feature called Notes, which was released last year.
Tiktok says its footnote initiative will expand its existing global fact-checking programme, but it will not replace it.
The company says it continues to work with over 20 IFCN accredited fact-checking organizations in over 60 languages and 130 markets around the world.