TikTok has announced plans to fact-check and combat misinformation in the 2024 election, adding to a trend of Big Tech companies adopting such measures.
The China-owned app said Thursday it will provide an election guide in the app, which will link to resources on voting, how to register, and how to vote by mail, depending on the state. The company will also bar political ads from being purchased on the app, including branded content. It will require users to identify if images or videos of political content are created by generative artificial intelligence. Finally, TikTok will partner with several fact-checking organizations to verify information on the platform.
“As the technology evolves in 2024, we’ll continue to improve our policies and detection while partnering with experts on media literacy content that helps our community navigate AI responsibly,” the company wrote in a blog post.
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The company’s plans resemble those of 2022 and 2020 but have been announced earlier than past cycles, with a few changes. One of the most notable changes to TikTok’s misinformation approach includes the company releasing “dedicated covert influence operations reports” about how foreign players are attempting to influence other countries throughout the year. TikTok released information about these operations in quarterly reports in the past, but with little detail.
Meta and Google announced last year that they would adopt similar plans for handling misinformation in the 2024 elections. These efforts include fact-checking posts, linking to official sources on how to vote, and restricting political ads a week before Election Day. Both companies also require political campaigns to disclose whether their advertisements include AI-generated images.