In a relief to Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, Delhi High Court on September 9 provided interim protection to the Bollywood actor against the unauthorised commercial and online exploitation of her identity.
Justice Tejas Karia noted that the unauthorised use of a celebrity’s likeness without consent not only causes commercial harm but also undermines their right to privacy and dignity.
Restraining several entities from misusing Bachchan’s name, image and likeness through technological tools, including Artificial Intelligence, court remarked that such misuse not only causes financial loss to her but also harms her dignity, reputation and goodwill.
“Unauthorized exploitation of an individual’s personality may have two facets – violation of their right to protect their attributes from commercial misuse, and violation of their right to privacy, which undermines their dignity,” the Court noted.
The court barred defendants, including unknown parties from using her name “Aishwarya Rai Bachchan”, acronym “ARB”, image, likeness and other attributes for commercial or personal gain. The order offers protection against technologies, including AI, deepfakes, face morphing and machine learning, across any medium.
“When the identity of a famous personality is used without their consent or authorization, it may not only lead to commercial detriment to the concerned individual but also impact their right to live with dignity,” Justice Karia said.
Aishwarya Rai Bachchan’s plea
Aishwarya Rai Bachchan had approached court seeking protection against online websites and individuals circulating AI-generated pornographic content and misusing her identity, apart from selling merchandise without her permission. She alleged that the defendants were using AI and deepfake technology to morph her face into sexually explicit videos and images.
What Bachchan’s advocate said
Bachchan’s advocate Sandeep Sethi, representing the actress, informed the court about “completely unreal intimate photographs” of the actor being circulated. “Her name and likeness is being used to satisfy someone’s sexual desires. This is very unfortunate,” he said. He also apprised the court of illegal sale of T-shirts and mugs carrying her images.