Best Practices
A great Knowledge Base is the foundation of effective hallucination detection. These practices help you build one that scales.
Size & Scope
Target: 20-50 Core Facts
Start with essential facts and grow over time:
Phase 1: Foundation (Week 1)
- 5-10 core facts
- Company basics: name, founding date, HQ, mission
- Leadership: CEO name, key roles
- Product: main product name, tagline
- Website source for all
Phase 2: Product Launch (Week 2-3)
- 15-25 facts
- All product names and pricing
- Key features and capabilities
- Customer count or market position
- Financial basics (funding, ARR)
Phase 3: Maintenance (Week 4+)
- Add 5-10 facts monthly
- Update quarterly financials
- Document new products or partnerships
- Refine existing facts based on Shield detections
Quality Over Quantity
50 precise, well-sourced facts beat 500 vague claims.
Compare:
Bad set (500 facts, low value):
- “We’re good at AI”
- “Our team is smart”
- “Customers love us”
- “We’re different from competitors”
Good set (50 facts, high value):
- “Founded 2024, $15M Series B”
- “CEO Sarah Chen (Google, Stanford PhD)”
- “Shield: 94% accuracy, 9+ engines”
- “500+ enterprise customers”
- “Only platform with SHA-256 keyed history”
Quality nuggets:
- Are specific and measurable
- Have source URLs
- Reflect current reality
- Are defensible in audits
- Produce fewer false Shield alerts
Organization Strategy
Assign Ownership
For teams >5 people, assign nugget categories to owners:
| Category | Owner | Review Frequency |
|---|---|---|
| Company | CEO / Head of Ops | Quarterly |
| Products | VP Product | Monthly |
| Leadership | CEO / HR | Quarterly |
| Financial | CFO | Monthly (after close) |
| Technical | CTO | Quarterly |
| Legal | General Counsel | Quarterly |
| Competitive | VP Sales/Marketing | Monthly |
When facts need updates, owners get reminders. This prevents stale facts from dragging down Shield accuracy.
Document the Why
For each fact, maintain a one-line note on why it’s in the Knowledge Base:
- “Used in investor pitches” → High importance
- “Marketing claim, update quarterly” → Needs review before each campaign
- “Internal benchmark, confidential” → Tag as private
- “Customer-facing SLA” → Legal holds you to it
Use tags to track this automatically.
Confidence Scoring
Calibration
Confidence scores should reflect reality. Miscalibration creates false Shield alerts:
Over-confident facts (marked 1.0 when actually uncertain)
- Shield flags minor discrepancies
- Leads to alert fatigue
- Teams lose trust in Shield
Under-confident facts (marked 0.6 when well-established)
- Shield ignores clear hallucinations
- Misses brand damage
- Waste of the tool
Guidelines by Category
| Category | Typical Confidence | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| Company | 0.95-1.0 | Founded date, HQ, public employee count |
| Products | 0.90-0.95 | Pricing (if public), features (from your docs) |
| Leadership | 0.95-1.0 | CEO/founder names (public) |
| Financial | 0.95-1.0 (historic) / 0.80-0.90 (projections) | Q4 revenue, Series B amount; Q2 projections |
| Technical | 0.85-0.95 | SLA claims (published), benchmark results (yours) |
| Legal | 0.95-1.0 | Certifications (current), compliance status |
| Competitive | 0.70-0.85 | Market position, relative claims |
Red Flags (Mark <0.8)
These belong in your Knowledge Base as lower-confidence claims:
- “We’re the fastest” (subjective)
- “Industry-leading features” (marketing)
- “First to market” (needs verification)
- Revenue growth rates (estimates)
- Competitor comparisons (usually disputed)
Shield will still check them, but won’t over-alert.
Maintenance Schedule
Weekly
- Review Shield alerts pointing to nugget mismatches
- If nugget needs updating: edit immediately
- Update prices if you changed them
Monthly
- Check for new product launches needing nuggets
- Review team-owned categories for drift
- Add customer wins or partnerships as relevant
Quarterly
- Deep review of all facts
- Update financials (especially quarterly metrics)
- Archive irrelevant facts
- Check expiry dates coming up
Annually
- Full Knowledge Base audit
- Recalibrate confidence scores based on Shield accuracy
- Trim outdated facts
- Plan next 12 months of fact updates
Source Management
Always Include URLs
Every fact should have a source:
Good sources:
- Company website (/about, /press, /products)
- Published press releases
- SEC filings (if public)
- Published benchmarks or reports
- Signed contracts (private, internal link)
Avoid:
- Vague references (“our records show”)
- Personal claims without backup (“I remember…”)
- Rumors or industry gossip
Update Source Links
Every 6 months, verify source URLs still work:
- Go to Knowledge Base → Tools → Check Links
- System crawls all source URLs
- Reports dead links
- Click Fix to update URL or remove source
Time-Sensitive Facts
Expiry Management
Set expiry dates strategically:
Quarterly Financials
- Fact: “Q4 2025 ARR: $8.2M”
- Expiry: 2026-03-31 (when Q1 closes)
- Reminder: 2026-03-24 (1 week before)
Funding Announcements
- Fact: “Series B: $15M raised March 2024”
- Expiry: Never (evergreen)
Temporary Claims
- Fact: “Early-bird pricing: 40% off, limited time”
- Expiry: 2026-04-30 (when offer ends)
Annual Certifications
- Fact: “SOC 2 Type II certified through Dec 2025”
- Expiry: 2025-12-31 (renewal deadline)
Expiry Reminders
You get reminders 1-2 weeks before expiry:
- Email notification
- Dashboard badge on Knowledge Base
- Option to extend, update, or remove
When a fact expires, Shield automatically stops using it. This prevents stale facts from dominating detection.
Handling Shield Detections
When Shield flags an inaccuracy, it might surface a nugget issue:
Scenario 1: Nugget is Wrong
- AI said: “TruthVouch was founded in 2023”
- Your nugget: “Founded in 2024” (1.0 confidence)
- Reality: Actually founded in 2023
- Fix: Update nugget to “Founded in 2023”, edit reason “Shield detection corrected stale fact”
Scenario 2: AI is Wrong
- AI said: “TruthVouch costs $10,000/month”
- Your nugget: “Starting at $349/month” (0.95 confidence)
- Reality: Your pricing is correct
- Fix: This is a true positive detection. Deploy correction via Shield.
Scenario 3: Nugget Too Narrow
- AI said: “TruthVouch offers Compliance AI”
- Your nugget: “Offers Shield, Brand Intelligence, Governance” (incomplete product list)
- Reality: You offer 7 products
- Fix: Update nugget to comprehensive product list
Track these corrections. If Shield frequently detects against a nugget, it’s often a signal the nugget needs updating.
Team Scaling
1-5 People
- One person (usually CEO) owns all nuggets
- Update weekly, especially before launches
- Use Auto-Discovery to reduce manual work
5-20 People
- Assign category owners (Product, Finance, etc.)
- Create review schedule
- Use tags to track status (needs-review, legal-approved)
- Set edit permissions by category
20+ People
- Implement workflow: Create → Team Review → Approval → Published
- Use version history and audit trail
- Integrate with compliance processes
- Automate routine updates (daily API calls for uptime SLA)
Integrations
Connect to CMS
Sync facts with your website:
- Add facts to Knowledge Base
- Enable “Website Sync” in Settings
- Facts auto-populate Schema.org JSON-LD
- Publish JSON-LD to your domain
- AI engines crawl and learn your truth
Connect to Product Docs
Link product facts to your public docs:
- Fact: “Shield: 94% detection accuracy”
- Source: https://docs.truthvouch.com/shield/accuracy
- When docs update, source URL stays valid
Connect to Compliance
Use facts in your Trust Center and public compliance docs:
- Compliance reports pull from nuggets
- Certification list auto-syncs
- Financial summaries pull from Financial nuggets
Avoiding Common Pitfalls
Pitfall 1: Overstuffing
Create one fact per nugget. Don’t combine:
- “Founded 2024, raised $15M, 150 employees” → 3 nuggets
Pitfall 2: Marketing Inflation
Don’t use marketing language without adjusting confidence:
- “Industry-leading AI detection” (0.95) → Too confident; should be 0.7-0.8
- “Enterprise-grade security” (0.90) → Vague; should be 0.6 or define specifically
Pitfall 3: Setting & Forgetting
Knowledge Base needs maintenance:
- Quarterly financials go stale
- Product features change
- Pricing updates
Set reminders and owner assignments.
Pitfall 4: Mixing Public & Private
Don’t mix confidential facts with public ones:
- Private: “Burn rate $500k/month”
- Public: “Profitable since Q3 2025”
Use visibility tags (public/private/restricted) to prevent accidental exposure.