yep. photoshop can't "unswirl" an image any more than you can "un-smudge" or "un-blur" it.
although honestly if i was going to hide my face i sure as hell wouldn't use swirl. that still leaves all the original elements dispersed in a regular pattern. if he'd just used MS paint and put a black blot over his face he'd still be home free.
Not true, people on photoshop forums even unswirled the image themseleves as a test, apparently he swirled the image twice, the 2nd time he picked a certain point to swirl at, which was the hardest part as it took alot of trial and error to find.