A feel-good story has been shared on social media in the days since the Ryder Cup regarding Rory McIlroy, and, unfortunately, it’s not true. However, it’s an indication of an increasing trend of false positive stories.
A Facebook page called Golf Plus and another called Golf Today Insight, which both, among several other sprung-up Facebook pages, routinely post false information on their page and uses AI-generated images to sell the content of their claims, posted over the weekend that McIlroy had given millions of dollars to a Northern Ireland charity. The post claimed the sum of “his entire $10.9 million bonus from the Ryder Cup 2025 and sponsorship earnings to fund a series of homeless support centers in Northern Ireland, his hometown area. The initiative will help create 150 housing units and 300 shelter beds for those in need.”
If you watch golf closely, you’ll know that European Ryder Cup players do not receive money for playing in the matches. In fact, it was quite a point of contention between the European and American sides that, for the first time, the US players would be paid a $200,000-per-player stipend to compete this week. The US players, to a person, said that money would go to charity, but it was a talking point for captain Luke Donald and the Europeans.
That’s the biggest clue that this story is false. It’s not that Rory McIroy wouldn’t support a charity in this fashion.
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The other, however, is the stated score in the story. The post claims the matches were a 14.5-13.5 victory for Europe. That isn’t true either. They won 15-13.
What makes this story one so easy to share and like and comment on is that it feels good. False stories tend to share negative information, and these pages have been trying to do that as well. However, the ones that resonate the most are the ones that share false positive-sounding information.
It’s important for news consumers to understand the difference between something that’s true and something that’s false. There are some tells:
If reputable websites aren’t reporting the same information, it’s almost certainly false, particularly when it comes to a feel-good story like the one made up here.
If the social media posts feature links to nonsense websites, they’re almost certainly false.
If the images in the posts appear too good to be true, obviously generated by AI or intended to inflame, they’re almost certainly false.
Curiously, this isn’t the first time that false stories have circulated regarding Rory McIlroy making a large charitable donation. After McIlroy won the 2025 Masters in April to complete the career Grand Slam, similar false stories were circulating that he donated his entire $4.2 million first-place prize to an Irish charity. The organization was forced to acknowledge the story wasn’t true.
These types of pages are increasingly common on Facebook, and they post false stories with AI-generated images. They tend to post stories about the most popular golfers and golf celebrities, including Rory McIlroy, Scottie Scheffler, Tiger Woods and Paige Spiranac. The point of these stories is to gain followers so that they can qualify to earn payment from Facebook for posting engaging content on their platform. The folks behind these pages also point their followers to phony websites, overrun with ads, to get people to further read on about the false story and make them more money.
