120
Survey responses collected
42
User interviews conducted
2
Expert interviews (AI + cognitive psychology)
Gold
Indigo Design Award 2021
TruCan is a fact-checking mobile application that promotes a fact-first social media environment. Built during the COVID-19 pandemic in a fully remote setting, the app offers features that search, analyze, and intuitively display accurate sources of information using artificial intelligence.
My responsibilities included brand identity, UI system design, interaction design, navigation flows, content strategy, and the vision video — from low-fidelity concepts to high-fidelity mockups.
Social media users are overwhelmed with the excess of information available online, and therefore often fall victim to misinformation — consequently sharing the same information and creating an inevitable cycle. A recent MIT study concluded that false news travels 6 times faster on Twitter than truthful news, and human users are more at fault than bots.
Access to the right information, at the right time, in the right format is critical. We set out to create a platform that enables social media users to be better informed through an unintrusive and consistent method — with the help of artificial intelligence.
Key insights
Survey
Users look towards the source when determining credibility. Interest in the context of a post motivates users to click and learn more.
Expert Interview
Humans believe what they initially hear, then require an extra mental process to evaluate and disprove it. AI can help but users should retain final judgment.
Misinformation Test
Older adults focus on text while younger adults focus on images — pushing the solution toward combating textual misinformation specifically.
The team collected 120 survey responses, conducted 42 user interviews, 2 expert interviews (an AI specialist and a cognitive/educational psychologist), and performed a live misinformation test. Competitive analysis confirmed that no existing tool combined AI-powered fact-checking with a seamless social media experience.
Research
Journey map
Preliminary concepts
The solution
Spread the truth with TruCan
A fact-checking mobile application for social media that searches for and analyzes accurate sources of information for safe accreditation using artificial intelligence.
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Source Visualizer
Verify information by pasting a URL into TruCan's Source Visualizer. The app extracts key points, puts the source against related publications, and displays language composition, citations, and summaries in a visually clear format.
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Source Comparison
Compare two sources to see which is more reliable. If only one is provided, TruCan finds a credible counterpart to verify or discredit the claims. Suggestions are always backed by a large foundation of multi-source accreditation.
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Claim Maker
Write a supporting stance backed by related sources through AI. Supporting sources are cited within the claim and can be shared to text-based platforms. TruCan recognizes credible source references and suggests adding citations.
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TruType
An AI keyboard that offers related articles and an analysis of writing performance before sharing — directly through the Android keyboard. All of TruCan's capabilities consolidated for in-context use.
AI architecture
