Is this AI-generated, or is it real? As generative AI tools have become increasingly capable of creating realistic images, videos, and audio, they have also made it easier to impersonate real people without their consent. In response, states are increasingly adopting laws that impose civil and criminal liability for certain AI-generated content that replicates an individual’s identity, likeness, voice, or other personal attributes. This comes against the backdrop of existing federal and state intellectual property (IP) protections for unauthorized commercial appropriation of an individual’s name, likeness, voice, or other identifying attributes.

For organizations, AI impersonation presents risks in two directions. First, a company’s own use of AI-generated marketing content, digital avatars, voice agents, entertainment content, and other synthetic media may implicate state-law and IP restrictions when it replicates or appropriates an individual’s identity without authorization. Second, third parties may use AI to impersonate the company, its executives or employees, or other representatives, potentially causing fraud, consumer confusion, and reputational harm. Companies should address both categories through governance measures tailored to their risk profiles, potentially including pre-deployment and periodic testing, input and output guardrails, revised acceptable-use policies, response procedures for unauthorized synthetic media claims, and monitoring for company impersonation.