Hey, that's my voice

When companies use AI to copy your voice to make money

Last summer, as they drove to a doctor's appointment near their home in New York City, Mr Paul Skye Lehrman and Ms Linnea Sage listened to a podcast about the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) and the threat it posed to the livelihoods of writers, actors and other entertainment professionals.

The topic was particularly important to the young married couple. They made their living as voice actors, and AI technologies were beginning to generate voices that sounded like the real thing.

But the podcast had an unexpected twist. To underline the threat from AI, the host conducted a lengthy interview with a talking chatbot named Poe. It sounded just like Mr Lehrman.

"He was interviewing my voice about the dangers of AI and the harms it might have on the entertainment industry," Mr Lehrman said.

"We pulled the car over and sat there in absolute disbelief, trying to figure out what just happened.

and what we should do." Mr Lehrman and Ms Sage are now suing the company that created the bot's voice.

They claim that Lovo, a start-up in Berkeley, California, illegally used recordings of their voices to create technology that can compete with their voice work. After hearing a clone of Mr Lehrman's voice on the podcast, the couple discovered that Lovo had created a clone of Ms Sage's voice, too.

The couple join a growing number of artists, publishers, computer programmers and other creators who have sued the makers of AI technologies, arguing that these companies used their work without permission in creating tools that could ultimately replace them in the job market. (The New York Times sued two of the companies, OpenAI and its partner, Microsoft, in December, accusing them of using its copyrighted news articles in building their online chatbots.)