Deepfakes and voice clones: what the law offers now

Fake video and cloned audio are now cheap to make. People use them for scams, fake endorsements, harassment and sexual content.

Sexual deepfakes

Texas made it a crime to produce or distribute sexually explicit deepfake video of a person without consent. The federal Take It Down Act covers realistic AI-generated intimate images and requires platforms to remove them on request.

Fake endorsements

Using a person's name, face or voice to sell something without permission can be misappropriation under Texas law. It can also be false endorsement under the federal Lanham Act.

Defamation

A fake clip that shows someone saying or doing something they never did can be defamatory, the same as a false written statement.

Fraud

A cloned voice used to trick a family or a finance team is fraud. Report it to the bank at once and to the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center.

Copyright

If the fake was built from your own photos or footage, a DMCA notice may be the quickest way to remove it.

What to do

Save the file and the URL, note where it first appeared, and avoid sharing it further. The right legal route depends on what the fake shows and how it is being used, and the law here is changing quickly.

This article is general information about the law. It is not legal advice and reading it does not make you a client of the firm. Laws change, so speak to a lawyer about your own situation.