Chinese social media platforms roll out labels for AI-generated material

Major social media platforms in China have started rolling out labels for AI-generated content to comply with a law that took effect on Monday. Users of the likes of WeChat, Douyin, Weibo and RedNote (aka Xiaohongshu) are now seeing such labels on posts. These denote the use of generative AI in text, images, audio, video and other types of material, according to the South China Morning Post. Identifiers such as watermarks have to be included in metadata too.

WeChat has told users they must proactively apply labels to their AI-generated content. They’re also prohibited from removing, tampering with or hiding any AI labels that WeChat applies itself, or to use “AI to produce or spread false information, infringing content or any illegal activities.”

ByteDance’s Douyin — the Chinese version of TikTok — similarly urged users to apply a label to every post of theirs that includes AI-generated material while noting it’s able to use metadata to detect where a piece of content content came from. Weibo, meanwhile, has added the option for users to report “unlabelled AI content” option when they see something that should have such a label.

Four agencies drafted the law — which was issued earlier this year — including the main internet regulator, the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC). The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the Ministry of Public Security and the National Radio and Television Administration also helped put together the legislation, which is being enforced to help oversee the tidal wave of genAI content. In April, the CAC started a three-month campaign to regulate AI apps and services.

Mandatory labels for AI content could help folks better understand when they’re seeing AI slop and/or misinformation instead of something authentic. Some US companies that provide genAI tools offer similar labels and are starting to bake such identifiers into hardware. Google’s Pixel 10 devices are the first phones that implement C2PA (Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity) content credentials right inside the camera app.