Scarlett Johansson hits AI app with legal action for cloning her voice in an ad | An AI-generated version of Scarlett Johansson’s voice appeared in an online ad without her consent.
Scarlett Johansson hits AI app with legal action for cloning her voice in an ad | An AI-generated version of Scarlett Johansson’s voice appeared in an online ad without her consent.::Scarlett Johansson is taking legal action against an AI app developer for using her likeness in an online ad without her consent.
There’s no way they’d have a case unless the voice impersonated her, so I’d be shocked if the commercial didn’t present it as her, but I couldn’t find a copy of it online either. I did hear the fake Tom Hanks ad a while back, and it definitely claimed to be him, so this sort of throng has happened before. Also, there would be no point in using her voice unless the audience thinks it’s her.
there would be no point in using her voice unless the audience thinks it’s her.
Not necessarily. They could be using it to advertise its ability to mimic voices as a feature which is different from using the voice to make it seem like Scarlett Johansson is actually endorsing the product. It would depend on how it's presented.
Sure, in that hypothetical, there would be no case, but that would make her legal team absolute idiots for thinking that simple mimicry would be a case they could win. And there is absolutely no reason to think they are idiots since Johansson doesn’t have a history of frivolous lawsuits or losing her legal battles. She went up against hackers stealing her nudes as well as Disney and won both cases, so I’m going to give her legal team the benefit of the doubt here.
Yeah, I’m absolutely against the whole “using published works to train AI violates copyright” trend. It doesn’t make sense as long as the AI is trained not to violate copyright with its results. People are trained on published works all the time, and they aren’t punished until they violate the law with the work that they produce. I think the same rules should apply to AI.