The Philippine House of Representatives has passed House Bill No. 9465, the “Digital Media Anti-False Information Act,” with an overwhelming 286-3 vote. Spearheaded by House Majority Leader Sandro Marcos, the bill seeks to penalize the creation, financing, and dissemination of false information intended to cause public harm, with punishments ranging from six to 12 years in prison and heavy fines. While the bill aims to address the rampant spread of online disinformation, it has ignited a fierce backlash from journalists, researchers, and civil society groups who argue that the legislation, in its current form, poses a severe threat to free speech and could be weaponized against political dissenters.
Opponents of the bill, including a coalition of 67 newsrooms and over 80 journalists, argue that the government should not be the final arbiter of truth. They point to the country’s existing legal landscape, where “red-tagging”—the practice of labeling activists and journalists as communist insurgents—has historically used criminal libel and anti-terror laws to silence dissent. Critics fear that the vague definitions of “verifiable public harm” and “materially assisting” a disinformation network will provide a legal loophole for those in power to persecute critics, despite the bill’s stated exemptions for investigative journalism, satire, and political criticism.
A major point of contention is the comparison of the bill to Singapore’s Protection from Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act (POFMA). While proponents suggest the bill follows this international model, researchers argue this is a dangerous cultural mismatch. Unlike Singapore, the Philippines suffers from low institutional trust and a history where political elites have allegedly benefited from the very disinformation networks the bill claims to target. Researchers note that President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and his family have been linked to long-term social media campaigns designed to rehabilitate the image of the late Ferdinand Marcos Sr.’s martial law regime, making the government an unreliable guardian of factual integrity.
Furthermore, critics argue the bill misses the mark by targeting individual posters rather than the systemic “grey economy” of PR firms and troll farms that drive disinformation. By focusing on the final user, the legislation ignores the organized, corporate-level strategies that amplify falsehoods on a massive scale. Experts warn that a teenager experimenting with AI could face the same severity of punishment as a professional troll farm operator, while social media platforms themselves are largely shielded from meaningful accountability due to the bill’s high evidentiary bars and negligible fines.
The legislative path forward remains uncertain, as the Senate has yet to form a committee to deliberate the bill following a leadership shake-up. However, there is growing alarm regarding potential Senate versions of the measure, which could further broaden the scope of liability to include users who share posts with “reasonable grounds to suspect” falsehoods. Additionally, some proposals involve the creation of a government-led “Digital Media Integrity Council” with the power to order content takedowns without court oversight, a move that civil society groups view as a direct pathway to state-sponsored censorship.
As an alternative, researchers are calling for a shift in focus from policing “truth” to regulating the amplification of content. They advocate for an “accountability bill” that mandates transparency in algorithms, content moderation, and the financial structures behind influence operations. With the 2028 presidential election cycle approaching, the window for meaningful debate is closing, leaving journalists and advocates in a race against time to convince lawmakers to abandon a policy they believe will ultimately suppress the very democratic discourse it claims to protect.