Bombay High Court Restrains AI Platforms from Unauthorized Voice Cloning of Arijit Singh

HC Restrains AI Platforms From Cloning Arijit Singh's Voice

In the past few months, actors Amitabh Bachchan, Jackie Shroff and Anil Kapoor have approached various courts seeking action against unauthorised use of their persona The Bombay High Court (HC) has restrained a clutch of platforms and individuals from offering AI tools that allow users to convert their voice into Bollywood singer Arijit Singh's voice. In an ex-parte order dated July 26, Justice RI Chagla observed that the platforms were emboldening internet users to create counterfeit sound recordings and videos that misuse the Singh's character and identity. The directions came in response to a petition filed by the singer seeking protection of his personality rights. Granting the injunction till September 3, the HC has posted the matter for next hearing on September 2. The plea named platforms such as Codible Ventures LLP, 100x Engineers, Hugging Face Inc., Audimee Me, Go Green Tale, Godehope and Kreate as respondents. "In my view, creation of new audio or video content/songs/videos in the Plaintiff's AI name/voice, photograph, image, likeness and persona without his consent and commercially using the same could potentially jeopardise the Plaintiff's career/livelihood," noted the HC. Arguing for the singer, counsel Hiren Kamod and Vaibhav Keni said that the platforms were offering tools to their customers to unauthorisedly create AI-generated voice models of celebrities and popular fictional characters. "Permitting the defendants (AI platforms) to continue exploiting/violating the Plaintiff's (Singh) personality/publicity rights, without Plaintiff's consent also jeopardises the Plaintiff's career as a performer/singer and his status of a celebrity... The act of creating and disseminating videos... on how to use unauthorised AI models to replicate a celebrity's voice such as Plaintiff without his consent cannot be shielded under the right of freedom of speech and expression," argued Singh's lawyers. The development comes at a time when generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) has paved the way for easy creation of deepfakes. Unlike previously, the emerging technology allows users to simply input their audio file onto a platform and generate the output in the voice of a popular celebrity. However, Arijit Singh is not the first to seek relief in such a matter. Earlier this year, an owner of a Rishikesh-based firm was arrested for allegedly creating several deep fake videos on social media platforms that showed actor Amitabh Bachchan promoting products related to sexual health. In May, Delhi HC passed an injunction against the unauthorised use of actor Jackie Shroff's voice, and other personal attributes and prohibited the exploitation of Shroff's "persona" through deepfakes without his explicit consent. In September last year, Delhi HC also restrained social media and ecommerce platforms from misusing voice and other attributes of actor Anil Kapoor and barred them from creating AI-generated videos from infringing on the publicity rights of Kapoor. Last month, the Bombay HC also directed social media platforms to take down deepfakes that featured NSE MD and CEO Ashishkumar Chauhan offering stock recommendations

Bombay HC Restrains AI Platforms from Arijit Singh's Unauthorised Voice Cloning

In a relief to singer Arijit Singh, the Bombay High Court has recently restrained a clutch of AI firms and individuals from providing a tool to convert anyone's voice into the Bollywood playback singer's voice. He has approached the court to protect his personality rights. Justice R.I. Chagla in his ex-parte order against several companies observed that these defendants are emboldening internet users to create counterfeit sound recordings and videos that misuse the plaintiff's (Singh's) character and identity. The court has granted an injunction against all the parties till September 3 and has posted the hearing on September 2. "In my view, creation of new audio or video content/songs/videos in the Plaintiff's AI name/voice, photograph, image, likeness and persona without his consent and commercially using the same could potentially jeopardize the Plaintiff's career/livelihood," observed the court in its July 26 order. Before the court's order, counsel Hiren Kamod and Vaibhav Keni of law firm Legasis Partners appeared for the singer and argued that the respondents appear to be in the business of providing means and tools to their customers to unauthorizedly creating AI-generated voice models of celebrities and popular fictional characters. "Permitting the defendants to continue exploit/violate the Plaintiff's personality/publicity rights, without Plaintiff's consent also jeopardizes the Plaintiff's career as a performer/singer and his status of a celebrity," argued Singh's lawyers. "In so far as acts of defendant Nos.1,2 and 7 are concerned, the act of creating and disseminating videos (by using the name, photograph etc. of the Plaintiff) that instruct individuals on how to use unauthorized AI models to replicate a celebrity's voice such as Plaintiff without his consent cannot be shielded under the right of freedom of speech and expression," added lawyers. The petition filed by Arijit Singh names Codible Ventures LLP, 100x Engineers, Hugging Face Inc., Audimee Me, Go Green Tale, Godehope and Kreate among others were named as respondents. Recently, other Bollywood actors such as Amitabh Bachchan, Jackie Shroff Anil Kapoor and singer Kumar Sanu have also approached the court to seek similar relief from various courts.

AI mimicking Arijit violates rights: Bombay high court | India News - Times of India

The Bombay High Court granted relief to Arijit Singh, ruling that AI tools generating content using his voice, image, or other attributes without consent violate his "personality rights." Justice R I Chagla restrained eight online platforms from using Singh's attributes and ordered the removal of such content and voice conversion tools. Singh had refrained from commercializing his personality traits.