TikTok Grants Users Control to Reduce AI-Generated Media in Personal Streams

The platform is rolling out a updated setting that enables them to reduce the quantity of AI-made media appearing in their timelines. This initiative comes as the company disclosed that it presently contains over 1 bn content made with AI.

Testing and Rollout

The new functionality is being tested over the coming weeks before a full-scale release. This development coincides with a rise in content created by AI, fueled by recent AI video creators.

The Broader AI Trend

It has been noted that approximately one in 10 of the quickest rising channels on a popular video site only show content made by AI. A considerable share of this content is classified as low-quality AI content, a label for inferior, mass-produced content that is often illogical or surreal.

“We know from our community that a lot of users appreciate content made with AI tools, from computer-generated images to science explainers, and we want to offer the community the power to adjust the amount of that, based on their own preferences,” commented a company executive.

Scale of AI Content

The service shared that there are now 1.3bn videos on its network identified as AI-generated. In total, over 100 mn media items are submitted to the service daily, making clips made by AI a relatively small part of its total content library.

How to Adjust Settings

Users will be capable of decrease or raise the level of AI-generated videos they view by using the topic control feature in the application and selecting the AI content topic. Other topics that are already be adjusted under the tool include news, clothing, beauty, and dance.

Platform Guidelines

The platform’s guidelines oblige content makers to tag convincing AI-made content, and it forbids dangerous deepfakes of celebrities or critical incidents. Any realistic artificial content that is not labeled can be removed under its user guidelines.

In addition, the service will now add an AI-generated tag to content made using its own AI tools, or detected by an collaborative effort for identifying artificial media. This step is designed to stop users from attempting to bypass the labeling process.

Responsible AI Funding

TikTok is additionally establishing a two million dollar AI literacy fund for professionals and organizations to create informative material about responsible artificial intelligence. This program will support educational bodies specializing in teaching coding and technology.

Platform Protection

The platform has defended its content review process, amid controversy over intentions to lay off a large number of review team members in the United Kingdom. The company is set to eliminate a significant number of roles in its content moderation team in its British office, with trade unions and internet security professionals expressing worry that people are being substituted by machine-led review.

A company official clarified that people-led review would continue to be important, but automated tools can shield workers by filtering out the most harmful content ahead of it has to be seen by staff. The platform announced a notable drop in shocking and graphic content reviewed by safety staff over the last 12 months due to the use of its machine learning processes.

We believe it is crucial to combine people and machines to keep the platform safe,” she said. “We’ll have humans as involved in the system, but we further consider it’s very important to reduce exposure to unsafe media as quickly as possible, which is where a lot of the machine support is making a difference operate efficiently.”
Amber Farrell
Amber Farrell

A tech journalist and digital strategist with over a decade of experience covering emerging technologies and consumer electronics across Europe.