YouTube is getting its own fact-checking system - users will add notes on misinformation in videos

YouTube team has started a new experiment aimed at combating the spread of fakes and misinformation on the platform.

As part of the experiment, YouTube will allow adding notes to publicly available videos. It seems that this feature is very similar to Community Notes on X (Twitter). Essentially, it allows viewers to add context to a specific statement in the video so that other viewers can better understand the facts presented in the video. If the host of the video made a mistake or deliberately spreads false information, notes can be used to point out incorrect data.

Currently, this feature is being tested in the USA for a "limited number of contributors" who speak English. To supplement information in the video, the user must submit a note related to a specific video claim. This note will be passed on to a third-party expert. Then these assessors will decide whether the note should be made public.

If the note becomes public, other viewers can rate it in one of three ways: "useful", "partially useful", or "useless". They will also be able to provide their own context and sources explaining why they assigned such a rating. In the future, the algorithm will decide which notes to publish. This algorithm is adaptive, so if a note is initially rated as "useless" for some time, but then many people start rating it as "useful" due to the emergence of new information, the algorithm will react accordingly.

If the experiment is successful, the general public should start seeing notes on some videos "in the coming weeks and months".

Source: androidauthority