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← All fact checksAfternoon run · November 14, 2026 · #10 by reach
PoliticsAI-generated media

Is the photo of Tellado, Koldo García and his lawyer real?

Does a viral photo show PP leaders Miguel Tellado and Ester Muñoz meeting with Koldo García, the former aide at the centre of the 'Koldo case'?

False

The photograph is synthetic — an OpenAI watermark and no record of the meeting.

The image is AI-generated. Maldita.es and Newtral both ran it through SynthID Detector and found an OpenAI watermark, and no such meeting ever happened: the only PP-Koldo García contact the party admits was a May 2025 meeting with its lawyer Alberto Durán, not Miguel Tellado. The on-screen headline about a one-million-euro offer does describe a real allegation made by García.

+5Sources ↓Original post ↗
AI-generated
The post as it circulated, labelled by our media check.Image

Claims

✓ 1 true · ✕ 2 false

The image shows a security-camera-style photograph of Miguel Tellado sitting with Koldo García and Koldo's lawyer.123

“Tellado, Koldo e avogada.”

✕ FalseCentral claimHigh confidence

Two independent Spanish fact-checkers, Maldita.es and Newtral, both ran the image through SynthID Detector and both found an OpenAI watermark indicating the picture was generated or edited with artificial intelligence. That is a forensic finding, not a judgement call: a watermark inserted by the generating system is very hard to produce by accident. The two outlets also noted that the faces and glasses of the purported figures do not match the real people. Just as telling is what is missing. A photographed meeting between the PP's secretary general and Koldo García, the convicted former adviser at the centre of Spain's biggest political scandal, would have been published by every major outlet. Instead the only trace is social-media resharing plus fact-checks declaring it fake. The PP's only acknowledged contact with García was a May 2025 meeting with its lawyer Alberto Durán; Tellado was not there, and the Guardia Civil's UCO had already concluded that the encounters García alluded to involving Tellado never took place. Tellado announced legal action over the image's spread.

Still open: Who first generated the image and with which tool beyond the OpenAI watermark remains unknown from the record.

Koldo García claims he agreed with the PP's lawyer a payment of one million euros in exchange for information to bring down Pedro Sánchez.67

✓ TrueHigh confidence

This claim is not about whether the offer happened; it is about whether García said it, and the on-screen headline accurately reports what he said. In audios sent from prison and published by Cadena SER on 5 November 2026, García described a pact with PP lawyer Alberto Durán under which his defence would be covered and one million euros paid, partly through the publisher of Okdiario, in exchange for damaging information about Sánchez. Cadena SER, El País, EFE and RTVE all reported the allegation, and Cadena SER cited three sources plus documented payments of 242,000 euros from Okdiario's publisher towards García's defence. The wording of the headline therefore checks out as a summary of García's own account. That is a narrow finding. Whether the offer was really made is a separate question, answered below as unverifiable.

Miguel Tellado personally took part in a meeting with Koldo García and his lawyer.58

✕ FalseHigh confidence

The PP's own account rules this out. The party went from denying any meeting to admitting that its lawyer Alberto Durán met Koldo García — RTVE reports that shift, and that García's lawyer resigned the day afterwards. Tellado was not a participant in that meeting, which took place in May 2025. Independently, the Guardia Civil's UCO had previously examined the encounters García alluded to and concluded that those involving Tellado and Feijóo never took place. Against those two lines of evidence there is no camera, outlet or judicial record of a Tellado-García meeting; the only document is a synthetic image. The convergence matters: a party with every incentive to minimise its contact with García nonetheless admits only a meeting with its lawyer, while the investigating unit found no basis for the Tellado encounters.

The PP, through its lawyer, offered Koldo García one million euros to make false accusations against Sánchez.67

– UnverifiableModerate confidence

This is an allegation, and it stays one. On one side, García, a convicted former adviser, is backed by three sources cited by Cadena SER and by documented payments of 242,000 euros from Okdiario's publisher towards his defence. On the other, the PP and lawyer Alberto Durán deny that any one-million-euro offer was made, and Feijóo called the account absolutely false. The documented payments establish that money moved towards García's defence; they do not establish what it was for. No court has ruled on the offer, though the PSOE has asked prosecutors to investigate. A reader should weigh the seriousness of the charge, the partial documentary support and the flat denials together — this is precisely the kind of claim that neither a fact-checker nor a reader can settle without the underlying evidence a trial would produce.

Still open: Whether prosecutors will open an investigation, and what the documented 242,000-euro payments were formally for, are not settled in the record.

What was posted

X

A post on X by writer Suso de Toro shares a graphic styled as an overhead security-camera still, darkened and blurred, with name labels over figures said to be PP secretary general Miguel Tellado, Koldo García and García's lawyer. A headline across the bottom refers to a one-million-euro offer for information to bring down Pedro Sánchez. The caption asks readers to accept the scene as a real photograph of a meeting.

“Tellado, Koldo e avogada.”

“Tellado, Koldo and lawyer.” — translated

Posted on X. Per the provenance record, the same image had circulated for several days; the PSdeG social accounts posted it on 12 November 2026 and later deleted it, and Tellado replied to this poster and the PSdeG with 'Nos vemos en los juzgados' (see you in court).

Who posted it

X
@susodetoro1
View the account on X ↗

Account check

Looks like a genuine account62%
Likelihood of automation4%

Estimates from public signals — account age, posting pattern, audience — not a judgement of the person behind the account, and separate from whether this post is true.

What stood out

  • @SusodeToro1 is the long-standing X account of Suso de Toro (Xesús Miguel de Toro Santos, b. 1956, Santiago de Compostela), an award-winning Galician novelist (Premio Nacional de Narrativa 2003) — a genuine, publicly identifiable person, not a pseudonymous or synthetic persona.
  • Account has years of documented history: quoted by El Nacional (2017), Nós Diario (2019), ABC and El Español (2024), and it was reported at ~70k followers in 2019 and ~95k in July 2025 — strong evidence of an established, organically grown human account.
  • No trace of automated/coordinated behaviour: no bot-network, spam or inauthentic-amplification coverage found; posting style is idiosyncratic personal opinion in Galician/Spanish, consistent with a single author.
  • However, low reliability as an information source: posts are unsourced opinion and rhetorical hyperbole, e.g. claiming TVE news is 'in the hands of Israel, the Mossad' (Dec 2023) and comparing Israel's campaign in Gaza to Auschwitz ('the Nazis weren't so bad', Mar 2024).
  • He repeated and partly deleted/retracted the March 2024 post ('mal redactado'), which is a partial correction signal but not systematic sourcing or fact-checking.
  • Ongoing legal exposure: ACOM filed a hate-speech/antisemitism complaint over three 2024 posts; the case was shelved in May 2025 but reopened by the Audiencia Provincial de Madrid in July 2026 (reported 26–27 Aug 2026) — an active controversy as of 'now'.
  • Highly partisan and politically engaged: former BNG/Los Pueblos Deciden candidate and biographer of Ana Pontón; readers should treat his feed as activist commentary, not reporting.
  • Caveat: the supplied profile metadata is empty (null followers, bio, creation date, zero sample posts), so none of this could be confirmed from the payload itself; attribution rests entirely on the handle matching his known account.
Signals (10)+
Identity match
Confirmed public figure (Galician writer, b. 1956)
Follower count estimate
~95,000 (July 2025 reporting)
Posting cadence
High-volume personal commentary; described in 2017 as 'tweeting compulsively'
Follower ratio
Unknown (follower/following data missing)
Platform metadata completeness
Poor — bio, followers, creation date and post sample all null
Notable news coverage
El País, ABC, El Español, elDiario, Nós Diario, El Nacional, Europa Press
Fact check history
No fact-checker rulings on the account itself; but contested/retracted claim ('nazis no eran tan malos') and hate-speech complaint by ACOM
Legal status
Case reopened by Audiencia Provincial de Madrid, July 2026 auto (reported Aug 2026)
Political affiliation
Galician nationalism (BNG); former candidate, Los Pueblos Deciden (2014), BNG lists 2018–2024
Content type
Opinion/activism, not news reporting; occasional conspiratorial assertions about media and judiciary

Account checked November 14, 2026, 15:06 UTC

The media

Image
AI-generatedPresented as real footage· The claim depends on it

✓ What is genuine

The on-screen headline does summarise a real allegation made by Koldo García in audios published by Cadena SER on 5 November 2026. The names used are real public figures. The scene itself is fabricated.

The tells

  • ●●● Strong signal SynthID Detector found an OpenAI watermark, indicating generation or editing with OpenAI tools.Maldita.es and Newtral
  • ●●● Strong signal The faces and glasses of the purported figures do not match the real people.Newtral and Maldita.es
  • ●●○ Supporting signal An implausible head-to-body proportion and an odd cut in the table surface.Newtral and Maldita.es
  • ●●○ Supporting signal Cropping, darkening, blurring and overlaid labels obscure the artefacts that would give the image away.our visual review
  • ●●○ Supporting signal Our hive-v3 detector scored the supplied version as not AI-generated (99.75%), showing that cropping and processing can defeat a classifier.our detector

Synthetic-media detector

Detector ran

The claim stands or falls on whether the media is real, so the detector ran.

AI-generated likelihood0%
Deepfake likelihood0%

Scores are the detector’s estimate for the file as uploaded. A low score does not rule out editing, a spliced caption, or footage shown out of context — those are judged above. Model v3.

How we checked the media

  • Reviewed the image visually as presented in the post, noting the security-camera styling, blur, darkening and overlaid name labels.
  • Ran our own AI-image detector (hive-v3) on the image as supplied.
  • Compared our result against the independent forensic checks by Maldita.es and Newtral, both of which used SynthID Detector.

Sources

8 sources reviewed

Further reading

  • 1Maldita.es Maldita.es sets out the SynthID finding and the visual artefacts in detail.
  • 2Newtral Newtral's independent check reaches the same conclusion using the same forensic tool.
  • 6EL PAÍS El País explains the real allegation the fake image was built around.
  • 8RTVE RTVE documents the PP's shift from denying any meeting to admitting its lawyer met García.

The full story

The image did not come from nowhere. On 5 November 2026, Cadena SER published audios that Koldo García, the convicted former adviser at the centre of the Ábalos affair, had sent from prison. In them he described an arrangement with the PP's lawyer, Alberto Durán: his defence covered and one million euros paid, partly through the publisher of Okdiario, in exchange for information to bring down Pedro Sánchez. The story was carried by Cadena SER, El País, EFE and RTVE. The PP called it absolutely false.

Four days later, on 9 November, the PP's Cuca Gamarra admitted that Durán had in fact met García — a meeting the party had previously denied. According to RTVE, García's own lawyer resigned the day after that admission.

That is the soil in which the fake photograph grew. A party that had denied a meeting now admitted one, so a picture of a meeting felt plausible to people already following the story. The image supplied what the reporting could not: a visual, a scene, a face. It also attached Tellado, the PP's secretary general, to a meeting that, on the record, only Durán attended. The Guardia Civil's UCO had already concluded that the encounters García alluded to involving Tellado never took place.

The image then travelled through political channels. The PSdeG posted it on 12 November and deleted it after Maldita.es and Newtral published their checks. Tellado replied to this poster and to the PSdeG with a promise of court. The one-million-euro headline, ironically, is the accurate part.

Kernel of truth

The PP did admit, after first denying it, that its lawyer Alberto Durán met Koldo García, and García did allege a one-million-euro offer. The fake image grafted Miguel Tellado onto a meeting he did not attend and attached a real allegation to a fabricated scene.

Timeline

  1. May 2025

    The PP's lawyer Alberto Durán meets Koldo García — the only contact the party acknowledges. 8RTVE

  2. November 5, 2026

    Cadena SER publishes audios in which Koldo García alleges a one-million-euro offer from the PP's lawyer in exchange for information against Sánchez. 7EFE

  3. November 9, 2026

    The PP's Cuca Gamarra admits the meeting between Durán and García, while denying any money offer. 8RTVE

  4. November 12, 2026

    The PSdeG social accounts post the AI-generated image; Maldita.es and Newtral publish checks finding an OpenAI SynthID watermark, and the PSdeG deletes its post. 3EL PAÍS

  5. November 13, 2026

    Tellado replies 'Nos vemos en los juzgados' to Suso de Toro and the PSdeG, and announces legal action. 4ABC

How it was framed

Fabricated contentFalse context

The image was made with AI and depicts a meeting that never happened, presenting invented content as a real photograph. It also works as false context: a real, separately reported allegation about a one-million-euro offer is attached to a fabricated scene and to a person who was not part of the admitted meeting.

  • “Visual proof”. The post presents a security-camera-style still with overlaid name labels, inviting readers to treat the scene as documented fact.
  • Missing context. The caption 'Tellado, Koldo e avogada' omits that the only admitted PP contact with García was a meeting with lawyer Alberto Durán.
  • Borrowed authority. The security-camera framing borrows the authority of surveillance footage, which readers tend to trust as unposed.

Posted on X by writer Suso de Toro. Per the provenance record, the same image had circulated for several days, was posted by PSdeG social accounts on 12 November 2026 and deleted after verification, and drew a public reply from Miguel Tellado promising legal action.

Bias

NoneSlightModerateStrong

Leans anti-PP (pro-Spanish government / pro-PSOE). The graphic pairs a fabricated surveillance-style image of PP secretary general Miguel Tellado with Koldo García with a genuine news headline about the alleged million-euro offer, using 'UPS!' and '¡TELLADO!' framing to insinuate that Tellado personally negotiated with a convicted fixer. The visual juxtaposition exists to produce a political hit during an election campaign, not to convey accurate information.

Bias describes how the post frames its message — the slant of the language, selection and emphasis — and is judged separately from whether the claim is true. A true claim can still be framed with a strong slant.

How we checked

54 s
  1. 1

    Reviewed the image as it appears in the post, noting the security-camera styling, blur, darkening and name labels.

  2. 2

    Ran our own AI-image detector (hive-v3) on the supplied image.

  3. 3

    Searched for the underlying story: García's alleged one-million-euro offer and the PP's response.

  4. 4

    Searched for reporting on any Tellado-García meeting in November 2026.

  5. 5

    Searched for verification of the image by Spanish fact-checkers.

  6. 6

    Compared our findings with the checks published by Maldita.es and Newtral, which used SynthID Detector and found an OpenAI watermark.

✓ Claim checked✓ Media checked✓ Sources checked

Why 93% confidence

High

HIGH. Two independent fact-checkers using a forensic watermark tool reached the same conclusion, and the absence of any corroborating record of the meeting points the same way. Our own detector scored the cropped version as not AI-generated, but that is expected when an image has been processed, and it does not outweigh the SynthID finding.

Limits. We could not identify who first generated the image or with which specific tool beyond the OpenAI watermark. Our own detector could not confirm AI generation on the cropped, darkened version supplied.

What we don’t know

  • Who created the original image and when.
  • Which OpenAI tool produced it, beyond the presence of the watermark.
  • Whether any legal action announced by Tellado has been filed.
  • What the documented 242,000-euro payments towards García's defence were formally for.

Spot it yourself

Spot the fake

Looks suspicious, isn’t proof

  • The poster is a well-known writer with political views — that tells you about the messenger, not the image.
  • The image is dark, blurred and low-resolution, like real security footage can be — poor quality alone proves nothing either way.
  • The graphic has a dramatic headline and labels — alarmist presentation is a reason to check, not evidence of fakery.
  • The scene looks plausible, even ordinary — 'too perfect' or 'too ordinary' are feelings, not findings.

The actual evidence

  • Two independent fact-checkers, Maldita.es and Newtral, both found an OpenAI SynthID watermark using SynthID Detector.
  • Both outlets found faces and glasses that do not match the real people, plus proportion and table artefacts.
  • No camera, outlet or court record has ever produced such a meeting image, though it would have been reported everywhere.
  • The PP's only admitted contact with García was a May 2025 meeting with its lawyer Alberto Durán; the Guardia Civil's UCO found the Tellado encounters never took place.
  1. 1

    Ask who would be reporting this if it were true.

    A photographed meeting between a party's secretary general and a figure in a national scandal would appear in every major outlet. If you can only find it reshared on social media, treat that as a warning.

  2. 2

    Check whether fact-checkers have already run the image.

    Search the names plus 'verificación' or 'fact check'. Maldita.es and Newtral both published checks and named the tool they used, which lets you judge the method.

  3. 3

    Look at faces and details, not just the overall scene.

    Zoom in on glasses, ears, hands and the edges of objects. AI images often mismatch accessories and produce odd cuts where surfaces meet.

  4. 4

    Understand what a watermark check can and cannot prove.

    A SynthID finding of an OpenAI watermark is strong evidence of AI generation. The absence of a watermark proves nothing, because cropping and processing can strip it — as our own detector result on this cropped version shows.

  5. 5

    Trace the claim back to the original reporting.

    The real story here was reported by Cadena SER and others. Reading the original lets you see which details are documented and which were added by the image.

Takeaway

A fake image can be built around a true story: the allegation on the headline was real, the photograph was not. Separate the claim being made from the evidence offered for it, and check the evidence on its own.

Questions people ask

Is the photo of Tellado with Koldo García and his lawyer real?+

No. Maldita.es and Newtral both found an OpenAI SynthID watermark showing the image was AI-generated, and the faces do not match the real people. The PP's only admitted contact with García was a May 2025 meeting with its lawyer Alberto Durán, not Tellado, and the Guardia Civil found the Tellado encounters never took place.

Did the PP offer Koldo García one million euros?+

Koldo García alleged it in audios published by Cadena SER on 5 November 2026, saying PP lawyer Alberto Durán offered to cover his defence and pay one million euros for information against Sánchez. The PP and Durán deny it, and the offer has not been proven. The PSOE has asked prosecutors to investigate.

What does an OpenAI SynthID watermark mean?+

SynthID is a marker that OpenAI embeds in images made with its tools. When a detector finds it, that is strong evidence the image came from an OpenAI generator or was edited with one. The absence of a watermark proves nothing, because cropping can remove it.

Who posted the fake image?+

Per the provenance record, the image circulated on X for several days; the PSdeG social accounts posted it on 12 November 2026 and deleted it after Maldita.es and Newtral published their checks. Writer Suso de Toro shared it with the caption 'Tellado, Koldo e avogada', and Tellado replied promising legal action.

Why did people believe the photo?+

Because part of the story was true. The PP first denied and then admitted that its lawyer met García, and García's allegation about a one-million-euro offer was widely reported. The fake image attached a real allegation to a fabricated scene, which made it feel like confirmation of what people had already read.

Go deeper

SynthID
A hidden marker that OpenAI embeds in images made with its tools so that a detector can later identify them.
AI-generated image
A picture created by a machine-learning system rather than a camera.
False context
Genuine material or a real claim placed alongside a false scene or setting so that readers draw the wrong conclusion.
UCO
The Guardia Civil's central operational unit, which carries out complex investigations including political corruption cases.

People also search for

foto Tellado Koldo e avogadaTellado Koldo García reunión foto falsaimagen IA Tellado Koldo PSdeGTellado nos vemos en los juzgados Suso de Torosupuesta reunión Tellado Koldo abogado seguridad
For educators+
AI-generated imagery and provenance watermarks such as SynthIDFabricated content versus false context in the First Draft typologyThe difference between a real allegation and fabricated evidence for itHow cropping and processing can defeat image detectors
  • The headline about the one-million-euro offer accurately reports what Koldo García said, but the photograph is fake. Does a true caption make a fake image less harmful, or more?
  • What would you need to see before believing that two public figures met privately? List the kinds of evidence that would count.
  • If a detector says an image is real but a watermark check says it is AI-generated, how should you decide which to trust? What does that tell you about relying on any single tool?

About this check

Platform
X
Posted by
@susodetoro1
Posted
November 12, 2026
Age when checked
1–2 days old when checked
Where it spread
Spain
Audience
UK & EU audience
Language
GL
Status
● Post is live
Verified
November 14, 2026, 15:07 UTC
Published
November 14, 2026, 15:07 UTC

Reach. Shared by writer Suso de Toro (158 likes, 101 replies per X syndication 14 Nov) and by PSOE Galicia's leader; Tellado replied 'Nos vemos en los juzgados'. Checked by Newtral and Maldita 13 Nov amid Koldo's Cadena SER claims.

This verdict was generated with AI from the sources shown. AI can make mistakes — check the sources before relying on it.

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