How the TCI Scoring Methodology Works: A Deep Dive

January 22, 20258 min readTCI Research

methodology

scoring

transparency

Trust Capital Index uses a proprietary, transparent methodology to compute objective 0-100 trust ratings. This article explains how each component works and why the methodology was designed for reproducibility and institutional use.

The Six Dimensions

Every TCI score is a weighted composite of six independently measured dimensions:

1. Visibility (25%)

Measures how discoverable an entity is across search engines (Google, DuckDuckGo, Yahoo, Baidu, Yandex), news sources, and digital platforms. Higher visibility indicates a well-established digital presence.

2. Authority (25%)

Evaluates presence on high-authority domains — Wikipedia, major news outlets, government databases, and verified knowledge bases. Authority signals credibility and institutional recognition.

3. Sentiment (15%)

Analyzes the aggregate tone of public mentions using AI-powered sentiment classification. Positive sentiment contributes to a higher score; negative sentiment reduces it.

4. Consistency (15%)

Checks whether the entity's identity — name, title, affiliations — is presented coherently across different sources. Inconsistencies may indicate identity confusion or deliberate misrepresentation.

5. Risk Exposure (10%)

Scans for controversies, legal issues, sanctions, adverse media, and other risk signals. Even a single high-severity risk indicator can significantly impact this dimension.

6. AI Perception (10%)

Measures how accurately AI language models (GPT-4o) represent the entity's public profile. This dimension captures AI-driven reputation risks that traditional methods miss.

Data Collection

TCI collects data exclusively from publicly available sources through official APIs and standard HTTP requests. We never scrape platforms that prohibit automated access. Sources include:

Search engine APIs (Google, DuckDuckGo, Yahoo, Baidu, Yandex)
News APIs (GDELT, Google News)
Wikipedia REST API
Social media profile discovery
Link auditing and domain authority checks

Reproducibility

The same entity evaluated on the same day with the same tier will always receive the same score, regardless of who requests the analysis. This reproducibility is a core design principle that makes TCI suitable for institutional decision-making, compliance reporting, and audit trails.

Score Precision

Scores have a realistic precision of plus or minus 2 points due to natural variation in search engine results. This is clearly disclosed in every report.