SAN ANTONIO — First came the floodwaters. Then came the deepfakes.
Hundreds of photos and videos claiming to show the devastation in the Hill Country — along with celebrities rushing to help — began circulating online after last month’s deadly floods. None of them were real.
And the people posting them weren’t looking to help. They were after donations.
One viral image showed NFL legend Tom Brady rescuing a dog swept away in the floods. Another depicted Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes handing out supplies. Other fabricated photos showed celebrities singing at victims’ funerals.
The images were emotional, and the captions were convincing, but experts say they were manufactured to manipulate viewers.
“Whatever you see is not always true,” said Seok Kang, director of digital initiatives in the College of Liberal and Fine Arts at The University of Texas at San Antonio.
The News 4 I-Team discovered dozens of Facebook pages filled with AI-generated photos that mixed fake celebrity images with real flood scenes. Many of the pages had tens of thousands of followers.
“People have a high attention to this issue, natural disasters in Texas,” Kang said. “They target that, and then they really make people fall for it.”
The goal of the posts is to drive donations to fraudulent links. When the I-Team attempted to click on the links, our computers flagged them as unsafe.
“They’re trying to make a profit off of people by redirecting their good intentions to fake donation campaigns,” said Christopher Schwartz, research scientist at the Department of Cybersecurity at the Rochester Institute of Technology. “A lot of the stuff preys on your very human initial reactions, your desire to be a good person. You know you don’t want to have people suffering.”
The tactic is not new.
During Hurricane Helene, an AI-generated image of storm victims went viral and was even shared by members of Congress. Some deleted their posts after learning it was fake. Others defended it as “emblematic of the trauma.”
The I-Team traced several of the flood relief pages back to what appeared to be Houston business addresses. But Facebook’s page transparency features revealed that many were actually being run from Vietnam and other countries.
“They use foreign servers, so it is really hard to trace, and then they provide that kind of donation link,” Kang said.
Experts say the scammers often use what’s called a “truth sandwich” — a real photo, followed by a fake image, then another real photo. Sometimes even real pictures of victims were altered to make the scam appear more authentic.
“Because they’re trying to exploit your brain’s sort of intuitive sense of reality,” Schwartz explained.
That’s why experts urge donors to pause and verify before giving.
Right now, many AI images can still be spotted by glitches such as distorted limbs, misspelled words, and airbrushed features. But the technology is improving quickly.
Kang and Schwartz both stressed the importance of education.
Before donating, experts say to make sure the fundraiser is verified, double-check the website URL, and use transparency tools on social media to see who is really running a page.
The I-Team reached out to Meta who said you can report pages and content that doesn’t seem quite right to its Help Center. The platform also removed some of the pages we brought to their attention because they violated Meta’s integrity policies.
Verified Donation Options for Hill Country Flood Relief
1. Community Foundation of the Texas Hill Country – Kerr County Flood Relief Fund
A longstanding 501(c)(3) based in Kerrville, this fund distributes money directly to vetted local organizations aiding rescue, relief, and long-term rebuilding in communities like Kerrville, Center Point, Ingram, Hunt, and Comfort.
2. Kerrville Area Rebuilding and Recovery Fund
Set up by the Kerrville Chamber of Commerce, this fund supports local businesses with repairs, signage, utility bills, and other recovery needs.
3. Texas Search and Rescue (TEXSAR)
Deploying rescue teams across Kerr County, with funding accepted online to support their operations.
4. GoFundMe Verified Flood Campaigns
A curated list of individual, family, and community fundraisers vetted by GoFundMe’s Trust & Safety team
Created by families of the 27 Camp Mystic girls swept away in the flooding. This fund will receive any collectively-raised funds and also serve as an easy landing place for those wanting to donate to every family without having to search and contribute to each individual fund.
Periodically, funds from the Heaven’s 27 Fund will be distributed equally to each girl’s fund. The individual families will then use their portion for things such as providing scholarships, funding youth programs, supporting vulnerable groups, and other outlets to spread joy and hope in our girls’ names.