Author:Vishal v v
occupation: Advocate
Abs tract
The rapid evolution of deepfake technology, which involves the creation of artificial audio, video, and images that imitate humans, has triggered one of the worst intellectual property crises in history. Rooted in the convergence of technologies in artificial intelligence, laws on privacy, copyright, and personality rights, deepfakes pose novel difficulties for existing legislation. This paper studies the intellectual property violation by deepfakes, including copyright, trademark, and right of publicity; identifies the judicial and legislative measures adopted to deal with the threat in India and internationally; and determines whether existing laws provide an effective response to the problem. Using the case studies and legislation analyzed herein, this paper will conclude that current law fails to address the menace of deepfake technology effectively.
To the Point
Through the use of GANs and diffusion transformers, deepfakes create highly realistic artificial media whereby the face, voice, or figure of a real individual gets replaced or overlaid. This capability which has always been the preserve of Hollywood studios is now possible by using an application in your mobile phone , and the implications of the law will be dire.
In essence, a deepfake uses the most commercially desirable parts of a person’s identity; that includes their face, voice, and likeness, without their consent, financial remuneration, or legal permissions. According to the Identity Fraud Report 2025, 40% of biometric fraud attacks were deepfakes in 2024, with the rate at one per five minutes. In the period from 2022 to 2023, there was a massive increase of 3,000% of such cases. AI-created songs falsely attributed to artists like Drake and The Weeknd to deepfake ads using Bollywood actor Amitabh Bachchan as a victim.
Use of Legal Jargon
Copyright and Moral Rights: Deepfake algorithms are trained on large collections of existing photographs, videos, and audio recordings almost always protected by copyright. This unauthorized reproduction is also a violation of copyright under the Berne Convention (1886) and domestic copyright law . Moreover, deepfakes impersonating a musician’s voice or an actor’s performance violate moral rights the author’s inalienable right to integrity and attribution under Section 57 of the Indian Copyright Act, 1957.
Right of Publicity and Personality Rights: The right of publicity, a proprietary right to control the commercial exploitation of one’s name, image, likeness, and voice, lies at the heart of deepfake jurisprudence. This right is not contained in a separate statute in India but flows from the right to privacy under Article 21 of the Constitution as held in Justice K.S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India (2017). This doctrine renders commercial deepfakes that misappropriate a person’s likeness actionable wrongs.
Trademark Law and Passing Off: The creation of the deepfake where the celebrity appears to have endorsed the goods or services is an act of passing off because it denies companies from misleading the consumers regarding endorsement of their products or services. Passing off involves misuse of trademarks which results in losses.
Information Technology Act, 2000: The major act governing all aspects related to cyber laws in India offers some relief. For example, Section 66C deals with identity theft; Section 66D penalizes cheating through impersonation using computer resources; Section 66E deals with the publication of private photos of any person without consent; and Sections 67, 67A, and 67B pertain to obscenity and pornographic content on the internet. Nevertheless, all of these measures are reactionary and do not cover the systematic creation and dissemination of deepfake identity content.
The Proof
As regards the music industry, it should be noted that in 2023, the AI song ‘Heart on My Sleeve’ circulated across the web as it was claimed to have been recorded by Drake and The Weeknd. This case proved the catastrophic consequences for artists who can lose millions in earnings through deepfakes. Moreover, in 2024, Taylor Swift had to face the distribution of deepfakes of non-consensual intimate footage, which prompted immediate governmental reaction in the form of introducing corresponding legislation on the federal level in the United States.
In terms of financial losses, in early 2024, the London-based engineering consultancy company Arup lost USD 25.6 million after receiving a call from a deepfake impersonating their chief financial officer. The employee, in turn, transferred funds accordingly. Regarding politics, during the 2024 presidential primaries in the state of New Hampshire, voters were threatened through a robocall in which President Biden’s deepfake instructed not to go voting.
In India, several actors like Amitabh Bachchan, Anil Kapoor, Arijit Singh, and Aishwarya Rai Bachchan have taken legal action regarding unauthorized use of their identities. Specifically, TV Today Network sued a party responsible for deepfake impersonation of Anjana Om Kashyap.
Case Laws
Amitabh Bachchan v. Rajat Nagi & Ors. (2024) Delhi High Court
The Delhi High Court ordered a broad injunction prohibiting the unauthorized use of Amitabh Bachchan’s name, image, voice, and persona, including the use of AI-based deepfakes. The Court recognized that the actor possesses an inherent right to control his identity i.e., to indicate whether or not he consents to the use of his name, image and voice. Deepfakes can cause serious harm to a person’s reputation and mislead the public. This landmark decision extends personality rights to AI-generated synthetic media in the context of Indian law.
Anil Kapoor v. Simply Life India & Ors. (2024) Delhi High Court
A comprehensive injunction was entered by the Delhi High Court to prevent unauthorized commercial use of Anil Kapoor’s name, likeness, voice and persona, including via AI-based deepfakes. In addition to common law passing-off principles, and personality rights, the Court relied upon copyright (intellectual property), the direct tort of passing-off (intellectual property) and Article 21 privacy rights (imminent bodily restraint) as the basis for its jurisdiction, and thus, creating a “technology-neutral” interpretation of applicable law, demonstrating the judiciary’s creative application of law in filling gaps within existing legislation.
Arijit Singh v. Codible Ventures LLP (2024) Bombay High Court
In its decision, the Bombay High Court barred any use of Artificial Intelligence in mimicking the singer Arijit Singh’s voice and scraping his videos as part of an AI training process. The ruling confirmed the individual voice to be a non-tangibles biomarker eligible for legal protection, further reinforcing the necessity to protect the individual voice-based IPRs.
Justice K.S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India (2017) Supreme Court of India
This landmark nine judge’s bench ruling unequivocally declared privacy to be a fundamental right under Article 21 of the Constitution. It firmly establishes that the right of individuals to their personal data and identity is intrinsic to the constitution and becomes the foundation for deepfake claims of personality rights in India.
Overjet, Inc. v. VideaHealth, Inc. (2025) U.S. District Court, Massachusetts
In this precedent set by the US court on intellectual property rights, it was ruled that the protection of IP extends to AI-generated content too. The court established that unapproved reproduction of AI-generated content amounts to copyright infringement. This case provides direct guidance for global cases of copyright violations via deepfakes.
Conclusion
Deepfakes present one of the biggest threats to intellectual property in the twenty first century. They exploit a person’s most private attributes, like their face, voice, and identity, to make money, commit fraud, and harm creative industries, all without consent and often without legal repercussions. The promise of IPR law that creators and individuals maintain control over their creative and personal identity is at risk. India’s judiciary has shown remarkable innovation in stretching existing laws from copyright and trademark to Article 21 personality rights and the tort of passing off to tackle the harms caused by deepfakes. However, judicial creativity cannot replace the need for clear laws. The number and complexity of deepfake attacks are growing faster than what case-by-case judicial actions can handle. India urgently needs to pass a Deepfake Regulation and Identity Protection Act. This law should define synthetic media as a regulated category, set mandatory consent requirements for using someone’s likeness or voice, impose strict liability on platforms making money from non-consensual deepfake content, require labeling for AI-generated content, and make the creation and distribution of harmful deepfakes a crime. On an international level, we also need consistent standards under the WIPO framework to tackle cross-border enforcement issues. Your face is your most basic form of intellectual property. A legal system that allows for its total commercial exploitation without consent and without a way to seek justice cannot truly protect either intellectual property or human dignity.
FAQs
Q1. What is a deepfake and why does it concern intellectual property law?
A deepfake is an AI-generated synthetic image, video, or audio that convincingly mimics a real person. It concerns IPR law because it typically involves unauthorized use of copyrighted material for AI training, misappropriation of a person’s likeness and voice (protected as personality rights), and false endorsement — all constituting violations of copyright, trademark, and right of publicity doctrines.
Q2. Is there a specific law against deepfakes in India?
As of 2025, India has no standalone deepfake legislation. Victims must rely on provisions under the IT Act 2000, Copyright Act 1957, common law personality rights, and Article 21 constitutional protections. The proposed Digital India Bill is expected to introduce more specific provisions, but comprehensive legislation is yet to be enacted.
Q3. Can an ordinary person seek legal remedy against a deepfake?
Yes, in principle. Any person whose likeness or voice is used without consent may seek civil remedies for privacy invasion and personality rights violation, and criminal remedies under Sections 66C, 66D, and 66E of the IT Act. However, the absence of dedicated legislation makes effective enforcement challenging, particularly for non-celebrity victims.
References
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16. Justice K.S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India (2017) 10 SCC 1.
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18. Anil Kapoor v. Simply Life India & Ors. CS(COMM) 652/2023 (Delhi High Court, 2024).
19. Arijit Singh v. Codible Ventures LLP (Bombay High Court, 2024).
20. Overjet, Inc. v. VideaHealth, Inc. (U.S. District Court, D. Massachusetts, 2025).
21. Information Technology Act, 2000 (India), Sections 66C, 66D, 66E, 67, 67A, 67B.
22. Copyright Act, 1957 (India), Section 57 (Moral Rights of Authors).
23. Identity Fraud Report 2025, cited in DataSecure, ‘Deep Fake Technology in India’ (2025).
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