A closer look at the output of Pilipinas Today reveals a disregard for basic journalistic standards. Unlike legitimate newsrooms, Pilipinas Today does not disclose its editorial board, ownership structure, or ethics policies on its digital assets.
The content itself often lacks the "what, where, when, why, how, and so what" that are essential to news reporting. One article about P125 million in confidential funds spent by Sara Duterte was only three sentences long; it featured a single quote but provided no context, date, nor location for the statement.
On social media, the platform relies heavily on "news cards" — square images with headlines and short captions. These cards rarely link to full stories and never disclose individual authors, functioning more as quick-hitting messaging tools than as entries for public record.
True news organizations also abide by self-regulated ethics standards where objectivity and public service — and not political interests — prevail. But the opposite was observed in some of Pilipinas Today's content.
Through natural language processing, Rappler looked into a representative sample of more than 1.3 million posts published by Pilipinas Today-named pages since 2023, the year the group was founded.
A big majority of the sampled posts included Pilipinas Today's standard "news cards" with headlines, news highlights, quotes, and straightforward captions, with a few user-generated content and self-promotions in between. But a significant 25% of the posts boosted the image of public officials, including former House speaker Martin Romualdez, former Makati City mayor Abby Binay, former senator and now Labor Secretary Francis Tolentino, and Education Secretary Sonny Angara.
Some of these posts tackled government programs and initiatives, but instead of discussing the benefits and mechanics, they brought the public officials that pushed for these projects front and center.
A number of posts also portrayed public officials in soft content that has nothing to do with their government work. One post in particular, tackling Binay's survey numbers during the 2025 elections, blatantly included her number on the ballot — a key part of campaign paraphernalia.
"People have a right to know what they are consuming, [if they are] consuming journalism, advocacy, advertising, public relations, or political communication content or materials," said PAGEONE Group CEO Ron Jabal.
While he recognized that all these forms of communication are legitimate, each has a different set of standards in place.
"If content or information material packaged as 'news' adopts the appearance, tone, and dare I say, authority of journalism while serving some interests...the need for disclosure is critically important and has become imperative."
PR firm and troll farm?
Disclosures on its social media accounts show that Pilipinas Today is owned and operated by Sartine IT Solutions. The contact information on the Pilipinas Today website also uses the organizational email of Sartine.
According to an archived version of Sartine's website, which is no longer available as of writing, Sartine is an "exclusive partner of Synergy360 and Breyalex Technology."
On the website, "Sartine by Breyalex" is described as "a corporate brand and political consulting firm which combined data mining, data brokerage, and data analysis with strategic communication for corporate brand and political electoral and election process (sic)."
There are no records in the Securities and Exchange Commission database of Sartine's name. Rappler, however, found a copy of Synergy360's official listing records.
These documents described Synergy360's purpose: "to provide end-to-end business consulting services to organizations requiring software solutions from manpower to technology requisition."
There are four incorporators indicated on Synergy360's listing records — one of which is Renesar Deunida, who has been quoted in several news articles as the CEO of Sartine.
Document provided by Securities and Exchange Commission
Synergy's address as shown on its listing records is at the 35th floor of Eco Tower Building in Bonifacio Global City in Taguig City — the same address found on Sartine's archived website.
Meanwhile, Pilipinas Today's website lists a different address: 339 Gil Puyat Avenue, Makati City. The same address is listed on Breyalex's Instagram page.
In 2018, Breyalex allegedly ran troll operations on Facebook during that year's gubernatorial elections in Guam, United States.
Yas Ocampo, project manager of Mindanews' fact-checking program, initially spotted Pilipinas Today posting disinformation and exhibiting coordinated, inauthentic behavior online. In January 2024, Mindanews fact-checked Pilipinas Today's claim about the presence of members of China's People's Liberation Army in the Bangsamoro region. A few months later in April 2024, the outlet reported Pilipinas Today publishing coordinated posts and ads promoting charter change.
His team, Ocampo shared with Rappler, investigated who was behind Pilipinas Today and found Sartine and its connections to Breyalex. They then found a 2018 video posted by the now-defunct Pacific News Center (PNC) on Facebook, reporting Breyalex's links to ad campaigns featuring candidates during the gubernatorial elections in Guam that year.
These ads were paid for using Philippine currency, published on pages with posts created from the Philippines and Breyalex's Facebook page featured on their profiles, PNC reported.
A Manila Standard profile on Deunida published 2022 shared that the company "[serviced] big-time brands and prominent politicians from presidential candidates down to congressional bets in the last three Philippine elections (2016, 2019, 2022), using algorithm data as a weapon and social media as a platform."
In the end, one thing was "not a secret" for Ocampo. "Sartine never really denied, or they even actively advertised...that they really thrive in changing minds or pushing for political agendas," he said.
Rappler reached out to Deunida and Pilipinas Today editor-in-chief Aris Ilagan for their comments.
We first sent questions to Sartine's email address addressed to Deunida on June 16, but we didn't get any response nor an acknowledgment of receipt as of writing. We also dialed the landline and mobile numbers listed on Sartine's archived website on June 17 and Pilipinas Today's website on June 17 and 18. Calls to Sartine's numbers failed to go through, while no one answered the calls to Pilipinas Today.
To explore other options for contact, Rappler visited the listed addresses of Pilipinas Today in Makati City and Sartine in Taguig City on June 17 and 18, respectively.
In the Makati City address was an office space with the Sartine logo and "Sartine by Breyalex" on display by its front desk. The space has been deserted, with only chairs, desks, and other office equipment inside.
Meanwhile, found in the Taguig City address was a co-working space. We found that as of June 18, no company under the name Synergy360, Sartine, or Breyalex is renting spots in the co-working space.
We also messaged Pilipinas Today editor-in-chief Aris Ilagan via Messenger on June 23; he responded by saying he will call us on the same day. That call has not transpired. We then made follow-ups with Ilagan on the same platform on June 25 and 27.
We will update this story once Deunida, Ilagan, or any representative responds.
'Pink slime journalism'
Cheryll Soriano, professor of the Department of Communication at De La Salle University, deemed Pilipinas Today's operations "pink slime journalism."
Coined in 2012, pink slime journalism was described as "organizations that mimic local news outlets but push partisan politics or corporate communications without disclaimers or adherence to other good journalistic practices (e.g., not disclosing their funding sources)."
Soriano also pointed out the "creative" nature of Pilipinas Today's pink slime journalism, particularly its network of region- and interest-based pages that has allowed the group to create "a lot of opportunity for amplification."
"They really know how platforms operate — that they operate on the basis of algorithms," Soriano added.
In a perilous news landscape where legitimate news organizations are attacked, deprioritized by social media algorithms, and laying off staff, the resulting information gaps are then quickly filled by groups with political interests, said veteran journalist Inday Espina-Varona.
In this system void of transparency, the demarcation lines between what is news and what is paid content "have not just been blurred — they have disappeared," she added.
"What Pilipinas Today and its brethren [of pages] has done was built on a platform that works — by the way, if we see the results of things in the provinces — and then expands it exponentially to reach anybody, to serve anybody that can pay for it."
— Veteran journalist Inday Espina-Varona
This system poses particular dangers during election season, when people decide on their next leaders, as other public servants and crucial news events with no financial boosts "will never see the time of day," Varona said.
What can be done?
At present, anyone can create a Facebook page and place it under the News or Media Website category — even without having to present official documentation. Meta established a News Page Index to which newsrooms can register and avail of extra features, but this is not a requisite for pages labeled as news or media on the platform.
"They need evidence like this (the Pilipinas Today network) to be able to show how policies can be circumvented, how limits can be circumvented through creative operations using networks.... Platform governance will need to consider new forms of circumvention and abuses."
— DLSU communications professor Cheryll Soriano
Varona also called out the government for not penalizing social media platforms for the spread of pages like Pilipinas Today and profiting from it.
"I don't think that the efforts in Congress right now or in the executive department to clamp down on disinformation are helping because what they're attacking is the capacity of people for free expression — which is dangerous, a knee-jerk reaction — when that's not the problem," Varona questioned.
Varona also encouraged the reading public to be more discerning about the things they share online — do they personally know the profile or page that posted the content they're sharing, and do they know the source of that content?
"I think it's a slippery slope once we lower our standards...and then start [spreading content because] it amplifies [our] sentiments," Varona said. "We might actually find ourselves in bed with the same corrupt circles that we are trying to defeat."
— with reports by Pauline Macaraeg/Rappler.com
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