TikTok on Wednesday announced the public launch of Footnotes, a crowdsourced fact-checking system similar to X’s and Meta’s Community Notes feature. The technology will initially roll out to U.S. users as a pilot program, allowing contributors to both write and rate Footnotes on TikTok videos.
All U.S. TikTok users are able to view the notes that have been rated as helpful and submit their own ratings in return.
The company first announced its plans to test Footnotes in April. At the time, it described the feature as a way to give the community more context around TikTok’s content.
Like X’s Community Notes and other similar programs, TikTok uses a bridging algorithm that tries to find consensus among people who typically have different views. If both sides rate a note as helpful, then it’s more likely to be true, according to this method. This also guards against brigading, where one side tries to sway a decision their way by voting similarly.
The company says notes can help people better understand what they’re seeing on the platform by adding more information and context. Sometimes the person who posted the video that gets a note is actively trying to misrepresent a situation, while other times they may have simply missed other information or updates that could be helpful for viewers.
TikTok began allowing U.S. users to apply to be a contributor back in April, as long as they were at least 18, had been on TikTok for more than six months, and had no recent history of violating TikTok’s Community Standards. Since then, TikTok says nearly 80,000 U.S. users have qualified as Footnotes contributors.
Though new to TikTok, Community Notes-style features have existed for several years.
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Twitter pioneered this idea, originally called Birdwatch, back in 2020. It officially rolled out the Birdwatch fact-checks the following year and expanded the program globally in 2022. Now called Community Notes, the feature has expanded under Elon Musk’s ownership of Twitter/X. More recently, those efforts include allowing AI to generate notes and new ways to use the system for highlighting popular content on the platform.
X’s open source Community Notes concept has also inspired similar systems at other social media companies — particularly those looking to appease conservatives who felt that traditional fact-checking systems were biased against them.
In an effort to make amends with the Trump administration and hoping to thwart increased regulation, Meta dropped fact-checking this year in favor of its own Community Notes system in the U.S., raising concerns about the spread of misinformation. YouTube is also experimenting with its take on this type of system with its feature called Notes, which launched last year.
However, TikTok says its Footnotes initiative will expand upon its existing Global Fact-checking Program, not replace it.
The company says it continues to work with more than 20 IFCN-accredited fact-checking organizations, in over 60 languages and in 130 markets around the world.
