The Philippines' Social Welfare Bureau says it no longer provides direct financial support for education. Branding videos are circulating on social media that promote such schemes as “fake.” The video contains watermarks and visual inconsistencies that indicate that AI has been generated.
“DSWD Educational Cash Support for Everyone in the School” reads the English and Tagalog captions from Facebook video shared on July 9, 2025.
The caption also includes a link that allows people to enroll in a conditioned cash assistance programme offered by the Philippines' Social Welfare Development Agency (DSWD).
This video shows a man wearing a DSWD branded shirt with a student eating in the background talking to the camera from the camera.
He argues that all students are entitled to varying amounts of educational cash assistance depending on their grades, and encourage them to register online via the links provided.
The cash will be paid on July 12th, according to text superimposed on the video. The DSWD and the Ministry of Education logos are also layered.
Screenshots of false Facebook posts captured on August 1, 2025, added red x added by AFP
The same video was also shared on Tiktok and was shown over 1.2 million times. Similar videos were also shared elsewhere on Tiktok and Facebook.
These posts provide links to websites where people can register their name, address and phone number, but this site is not a government webpage belonging to the DSWD or the education sector.
Both departments have issued warnings about posts.
In a post on its Facebook page on July 11, DSWD stated that the circular posts and videos were “fake,” reminding the public that they are wary of information that is not sent directly from their official social media accounts (archive links).
A previous post by DSWD states that it “does not provide direct financial support for education,” but implements a scheme in which students in need can receive support in exchange for students struggling or have not yet learned what they have learned to read (archive links).
“The AI videos shared on Facebook pages that appear to be DSWD's educational cash support for all students are fake news,” adding a post from the Education Division to the verified Facebook page starting on July 17th (archive link).
AI-generated video
While reverse image search resulted in more incorrect posts, Google's “About This Image” feature identifies videos created with AI.
The ability to detect AI-generated images is based on Google's SynthID technology launched by DeepMind AI Lab in 2023 (archived here and here).
Screenshot of a Google page showing that the video was created using AI
A close analysis of the video shows that a watermark is included in the lower right corner of Veo, Google's video generation platform that allows users to create 8-second videos (archived here and here).
The video, which was accidentally shared, appears to have been created by stitching together three clips for approximately 8 seconds each.
Screenshot of the final frame of an accidentally shared video, VEO watermark is enlarged by AFP
The mis-shared video also contains visual inconsistencies, and despite the rise in meteors of AI technology, it remains an indicator of fraudulent visuals.
For example, in one video, two students walking behind the speaker appear to be fused into one.
Screenshots showing two students appearing to be merged in a video shared incorrectly, highlighted by AFP
The AFP previously exposed similar false claims about the Philippines' cash assistance program.
