DoT in damage control

As Holy Week approaches, the Department of Tourism (DoT) is moving double-time to guarantee that tourist destinations, particularly Boracay, will be safe for domestic and international tourists.

Some tour operators expressed apprehension over an “isolated” case where a Slovakian woman was kidnapped, raped, and killed in Boracay.

The Australian Embassy subsequently issued a travel advisory on the country, advising a “high degree of caution,” citing threats of terrorism and violent crimes.

That brought a bigger problem for the DoT which needed to calm the Australian government.

The number of Australian visitors to the country has been rising lately, averaging a 22-percent growth month-on-month compared to 2024.

Tourism Secretary Cristina Garcia Frasco urged the Australian government to “rationalize their travel advisory.”

Regarding the slain foreign tourist, Frasco maintained the death was isolated and law enforcers were on top of the situation.

Barking up wrong tree

While freedom of expression has been the primary topic in the ongoing debate over fake news, the bigger concern of the government regarding bloggers, vloggers and other so-called influencers on social media is the huge revenue leakage from these rich personalities.

Chief Presidential Legal Counsel Juan Ponce Enrile said the right to guaranteed freedom of expression in the Bill of Rights must be underpinned by truthful information.

“Social media practitioners should not consider their new-found tool as a license to disseminate made-up or invented information. Otherwise, we will develop an anarchic information system and disorderly society,” Enrile said.

Today, engaging the public through the worldwide web is driven more by the lucrative side of the trade.

Estimating the exact loss in state revenues from the earnings of media influencers, bloggers and other entities is challenging, as there is no definitive up-to-date figure that comprehensively quantifies this amount.

The Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) has recognized that a significant portion of online income, particularly of social media influencers, bloggers and vloggers has evaded taxes.

In 2021, the BIR issued Revenue Memorandum Circular 97-2021 targeting earners and initiating investigations into tax compliance, starting with the top 250 high-earning influencers.

The BIR’s focus was on unreported or underreported internet-based income representing a notable revenue gap.

While specific figures for total revenue loss are not explicitly stated in official reports, we can infer potential losses from related data points.

A 2023 study funded by Internews titled “Political Economy of Covert Influence Operations in the 2022 Philippine Elections” estimated that between P600 million and P1.5 billion was spent on online political influencers during the 2022 elections.

The spending, often unreported in official campaign finance disclosures, hints at the scale of the untaxed income in just one sector of internet earnings.

If this amount reflects only election-related influencer activity, a broader scope of untaxed earnings from lifestyle, entertainment and commercial endorsements should be substantially higher.

So-called social media personalities are raking it in from their online exposure in the Philippines since the country is a global leader in social media use, with Filipinos spending an average of three hours and 34 minutes daily on platforms, ranking 4th worldwide based on the Digital 2024 report.

The high engagement has fueled a booming influencer economy. The BIR has noted that influencers earning from platforms like YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram — through avenues such as the YouTube Partner Program, sponsored posts, and affiliate marketing — often fail to declare their full income.

For example, top influencers can earn significant sums such as a former international pageant crown holder who reportedly made $3.67 million or P183.5 million from sponsored posts in 2021 alone, yet her income tax, value-added tax and percentage tax compliance has been inconsistent.

A rough estimate might place annual revenue losses in the range of P1 billion to P10 billion or more, factoring in the scale of the influencer market, unreported freelance digital work and online businesses.

Congress may be missing the point about holding socmed personalities accountable for fake news, when the real harm they inflict is denying the government the humongous revenues it is due.