TikTok Tako

Submission 664

Part of a series on AI / Artificial Intelligences. [View Related Entries]

About

TikTok Tako is an artificial intelligence chatbot run through the TikTok app that can answer questions and chat with users of the app, meant to "make it easier to discover entertaining and inspiring content." The chatbot was first tested in May 2023 in the Philippines, with screenshots showing an icon for Tako situated on the right-hand side of the app, which can be tapped while watching videos to perform tasks like answering questions about the video and suggesting related content. In November 2023, the Tako chatbot sent a DM to numerous users, inspiring an influx of videos asking what TikTok Tako is, with some thinking the app had been hacked. The situation is comparable to an August 2023 incident where the Snapchat AI posted a Story for several users unprompted.

History

On May 25th, 2023, the @TikTokComms X^[1] page made a post announcing that they would start testing an AI chatbot in the Philippines that would "make it easier to discover entertaining and inspiring content on TikTok," writing:

We're in the early stages of exploring chatbot tools with a limited test of Tako with select users in the Philippines. Tako is an AI-powered tool to help with search and discovery on TikTok. Tako is powered by a third-party chat assistant and is designed to help make it easier to discover entertaining and inspiring content on TikTok. No current plans for this beyond these early tests, but we're excited to hear your feedback!

That day, The Verge^[2] published a write-up on the chatbot, writing that, while watching videos on the app, Tako will "display suggested prompts to help a user start a conversation with the bot." Screenshots (shown below) provided in the article show an icon for Tako on the right-hand side of the app's main screen, which users can tap to chat with the bot." According to the write-up, users can ask Tako questions, converse with it and get it to suggest content for them.

Online Presence

November 2nd, 2023 TikTok Tako DM

On November 2nd, 2023, TikTok and X users began making posts claiming that TikTok Tako DM'd them, but when they tapped on the DM, it disappeared or was unavailable. For example, on that day, TikToker^[3] @jaydensalaam posted a video about Tako that gained over 765,000 views in under a day (shown below, left). On the same day, TikToker^[4] @therealtammy1.0 posted a video about the DM, hypothesizing that TikTok was hacked, garnering over 150,000 views in the same span of time (shown below, right).