In the post-truth era, the harm caused by false information to society is becoming increasingly prominent, especially on political elections and major public issues. The rise of generative AI has also caused the abuse of technical means such as deep forgery, exacerbating this serious problem. Factiverse came into being, committed to using AI technology to fight false information and protect the authenticity of information and social trust.
The staggering speed of disinformation on the Internet has seriously affected Americans’ perceptions of candidates and topics of public health, climate change and immigration after the 2024 U.S. presidential election. The development of generative artificial intelligence, coupled with its ability to generate deeply falsified content and the tendency to "illusion" facts, may further exacerbate this problem.
Image source notes: The image is generated by AI, and the image authorized service provider Midjourney
To address this challenge, Norwegian startup Factiverse came into being. The company participated in the TechCrunch Disrupt Battlefield200 competition in October and won the Best Speaking Award in the Security, Privacy and Social Networking categories. Factiverse has developed an enterprise-oriented tool that enables real-time fact checks on text, video and audio content. The company's goal is to help companies save research time and reduce reputational risks and legal liability.
Founded in 2020, Factiverse is still in its early stages and has raised approximately US$1.45 million. Still, Factiverse has begun working with several media and financial partners, including one of Norway’s largest banks. Maria Amelie, CEO and co-founder of Factiverse, said they even provided real-time fact-checking services for the U.S. presidential debate, which has been used by multiple media outlets.
Amelli stressed that Factiverse is not a large language model (LLM), but a model built based on information retrieval. As a former tech journalist and publisher, Amelie has gained extensive experience in fact-finding in collaboration with co-founder and chief technology officer Wiener Seti. Their AI models are trained on high-quality data from globally reliable sources and fact checkers, rather than the “junk food data” used by generative AI.
The model uses machine learning and natural language processing technology to identify claims in information in real time and search on the Internet, including search engines such as Google and Bing, as well as academic papers. "The most interesting part is that we are not simply showing the first result in search engines, but suggesting the most reliable sources to ensure the authoritative content," Amelli said.
Currently, Factiverse claims that its ability to recognize fact-check-worthy claims exceeds GPT-4, Mistral7-b, and GPT-3 in 114 languages. Amelli mentioned that Factiverse has a success rate of about 80%, and the future goal is to attract more customers and improve accuracy around the world.
Amelli finally said: "We have enough funds to be the best, but our goal in the United States is to be the fastest growing company." She also mentioned that Factiverse plans to conduct a new round of financing in 2025 and looks forward to being able to Attract customers and investors who are willing to invest in trust and trustworthiness.
Key points:
Factiverse is a Norwegian startup focused on using AI technology for real-time fact checks aimed at combating online disinformation.
The company has partnered with several media and financial institutions and has provided fact-checking services in the U.S. presidential debate.
Factiverse claims that its model has a success rate of up to 80% in identifying and verifying information, and will further expand the market in the future.
The emergence of Factiverse provides a new idea and technical means to deal with the proliferation of false information in the information age, and its attempts in the field of fact verification are worthy of attention. In the future, how to further improve accuracy and apply it to a wider range of fields will be a challenge and opportunity facing Factiverse and the entire industry.