With the rise of generative AI, technology can now replicate a person’s image, voice, expressions, and even mannerisms with striking accuracy—creating digital avatars or replicas that are often indistinguishable from real life.
On July 10, 2025, Judge Paul Oetken declined to dismiss claims under New York’s Right of Publicity statute relating to allegations of AI voice duplication. Lehrman v. Lovo, Inc., 2025 WL 1902547 (S.D.N.Y. 2025).
Voice actors Paul Lehrman and Linnea Sage alleged that Lovo, Inc.—a company specializing in AI-generated voice cloning—created and commercialized unauthorized digital replicas of their voices. While Judge Oetken dismissed their Lanham Act claim, the Court sustained their claims including violations of New York Civil Rights Law and state consumer protection laws.
“Lehrman and Sage allege that they first learned that their voices had been used in unanticipated ways when they listened to an episode of the Deadline Strike Talk podcast narrated in part by an artificial voice … generated using “a paid subscription to Lovo.” Id. Judge Oetken cites the certifications that Lovo “had been marketing the clone of his voice as part of its subscription service under the stage name ‘Kyle Snow’ and that it was this ‘Kyle Snow’ voice that he had heard on the podcast” Id. Lovo promoted Kyle Snow as “ ‘an ideal male voice generator … for all kinds of content’ due to his ‘upbeat tone and slightly faster talking speed’.”
Lehrman v. Lovo, supra at *3. “Sage discovered that Lovo had created a clone of her voice named ‘Sally Coleman’ that was … marketed … using ‘side-by-side’ comparisons of Sage’s original audio recordings—the ones she provided via Fiverr—and the ‘cloned version of her voice.’
Id.
In his decision, Judge Oetken found that “when confronted with new technologies, “[t]he appropriate course … is to employ the theory of statutory construction that general terms encompass future developments and technological advancements” (citation omitted). Here, as in the visual context, construing the Civil Rights Law to exclude digital clones would frustrate the statutory purpose, and, for all practical purposes, enable commercial entities to appropriate individuals’ identities without restraint. In fact, allowing such appropriation by means of AI might be even more pernicious, because, allegedly, a functioning voice clone capable of saying anything, forever, can be created using a small snippet of original audio” Lehrman v. Lovo, supra at *22.
This decision affirms that individuals’ likenesses—including their image and voices—remain safeguarded even in a world where technology can mimic them almost exactly.
Judge Oetken also allowed Plaintiffs’ state consumer protection claims to proceed under New York General Business Law §§ 349 and 350, finding that “Plaintiffs adequately alleged that Lovo misrepresented the scope of the “commercial rights” that it promised to provide to its subscribers, thereby making its offerings appear more attractive” Lehrman v. Lovo, supra at at *25. “A claim is “materially misleading” for state-law purposes if it is objectively “likely to mislead a reasonable consumer acting reasonably under the circumstances… Lovo’s allegedly false claims about commercial rights constitute such misleading conduct” Id.
Generative AI raises fundamental questions about ownership, identity, and consent in the digital age. We will be watching Lehrman v. Lovo and other courts nationwide as they address identity rights and unauthorized digital replication.
By: John P. Bostany and Brittany K. Singh
The Bostany Law Firm PLLC
