Twitter Inc said in a blog post on Thursday that it is extending its crowdsourced fact-checking initiative by making observations on potentially false tweets available to more individuals on Twitter.

Last year, the social networking site started the Birdwatch project as an innovative experiment in which users were invited to detect deceptive tweets and submit notes refuting the material, which were subsequently attached to the original tweet.

Twitter, like other social media platforms, has long been pressed to do more to prevent the spread of false information among its 217 million daily users.

The Birdwatch pilot program’s 10,000 contributors’ notes have been archived on a separate website.

According to Twitter, a limited set of randomised users in the United States will now be able to read Birdwatch notes immediately on tweets and score the information’s usefulness.

Twitter stated that it plans to spread Birdwatch to more people in more countries over time.

On Thursday, some Birdwatch comments addressed misinformation about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last week.

The image of British superstar Paul McCartney waving a Ukrainian flag while on stage in front of a crowd was shared over 17,000 times in a tweet on Feb. 26.

The shot was taken in 2008 at a “Independence Concert” in Kyiv, according to a message attached to the tweet on the Birdwatch site.

People were 20 per cent to 40 per cent less likely to agree with the content of a potentially deceptive tweet after reading a Birdwatch notice about it, according to a poll, than those who viewed the information without the comment.

(Adapted from USNews.com)