Officials for Facebook's parent company have sought to reassure its new social media platform Threads will be monitored for misinformation in the same way as its other sites.
Meta executives appeared before a parliamentary committee examining foreign interference through social media on Tuesday, which is examining how Australian elections and government agencies can be safeguarded from online threats.
The appearance came less than a week after Meta launched Threads, which has been seen as a direct rival to Twitter.
Since then, more than 100 million users have signed up.
Meta's Australian head of public policy Josh Machin said the approach to Threads to combat misinformation or enforce community standards would be similar to that on its other platforms.
"All of the policies that currently apply on Facebook and Instagram apply on Threads," he told the hearing.
"Anything that would be removed or would violate our community standards on Facebook and Instagram from day one is being removed on Threads as well."
Mr Machin said while the platform was still new, work was under way to eventually have fact-checking labels on posts and labels identifying accounts as being affiliated with state-owned media.
"It's our aspiration to build that out fairly quickly. It's only a couple of days and we're delighted with the very positive reception the product has had after its release," he said.
"We're still building out broader functionality and partnerships in order to help users of the integrity of information that could be on Threads."
The Meta official said state-affiliated media violating policies on platforms would have posts removed.
It comes as the committee's chair, Liberal senator James Paterson, accused Chinese social media platform WeChat, along with its parent company TenCent, as being in contempt in parliament.
Despite multiple attempts for officials from WeChat to appear before the committee, the social media company has declined to appear.
Senator Paterson said the committee did not have the powers to force the company to appear due to it not being based in Australia.
"Compelling evidence has been put to the committee by expert witnesses that WeChat engages in surveillance, censorship and foreign interference on its platform, and yet, senators will not have the opportunity to test these propositions with the company or potential regulatory solutions to it," he said.
"It demonstrates contempt for the parliament of Australia by WeChat and their parent company TenCent."
It's estimated WeChat has more than one million Australian users.
"The committee will soon report back to parliament with recommendations to ensure the integrity and transparency of all social media platforms operating in Australia and to protect the freedoms of Australians online," Senator Paterson said.
"If WeChat believes these recommendations are unfavourable to their interests, they will have no one to blame but themselves."
Officials from other social media platforms, including TikTok, Twitter and Google, will appear before the committee later on Tuesday.
The final hearing will be held on Wednesday, focusing on the steps federal agencies are taking to combat foreign interference.
© AAP 2023