Rajya Sabha MP Raghav Chadha this week came into the Delhi High Court with a very contemporary problem. People are stealing his face. Not physically, but electronically. He sued to defend his personality rights against the increasing tide of fake videos and audio recordings that are playing on social media
Chadha wants everyone to know not to use his voice, name or likeness without his strict permission. You can see why. The web is a wild land at the moment. It’s easy to make a realistic video of a politician saying anything, with the help of someone with a decent laptop. They capture your voice in speeches, and process them through a computer program to create a synthetic voice that sounds just like your own.
Petition focuses on morphed visuals and fake speeches. In essence, Chadha’s defense attorneys stated to the court that anonymous internet users are trespassing. They’re going around warping the facts about him in order to mislead voters and harm his reputation. His face carries weight due to his public status. If there’s a fake video, that’s true. It takes minutes to cause damage. He requested that the court intervene and close down his commercial and digital exploitation. It’s an effort to regain control of what the public thinks of him.
A judge was surprised at a reaction
Inside the courtroom, things didn’t go exactly as they should. Justice Subramonium Prasad took up the case on Thursday 21st May. And, the judge had some intense remarks about the situation
Justice Prasad checked the actual grievance Chadha made. He highlighted a huge difference between identity theft and criticizing a politician. The court basically ruled that just because someone is taking down Chadha’s political decisions that doesn’t automatically mean they are violating his personality rights.
You bring a defamation suit if you’re upset with what people have to say about your political actions. The words were very clear from the bench. The judge told Chadha to amend his lawsuit to a defamation claim instead. It was a very rude awakening. Internet trolls don’t attack your political track record or your policies just so they can use your personality rights to block them. The law is very different in how it treats those two items. In imitation, the face is one thing, but when it comes to stealing a face to sell shoes, it is quite another. Another is making a political meme that is a hard pill to swallow. A politician is expected to face public criticism and the court did not intend to exempt a personality rights claim from the standard rules for responding to criticism.
Chasing Ghosts Online
Many lawyers refer to the fundamental problem in Chadha’s petition as a “John Doe” situation. It’s sometimes called an Ashok Kumar order in India. When you’ve no clue who it is that you’re being wronged by.
There are a lot of burner accounts on social media. A user on X or YouTube can upload a really damaging deepfake of Chadha and use a fake profile name, a random cartoon profile image and a spoofed IP address. Unless a court order is obtained, locating the actual “person” behind the keyboard is nearly impossible. The police have a hard time finding them. Platforms are unresponsive.
Chadha’s lawyers want a broad injunction against these unknown creators. The idea is to obtain a piece of paper from the judge that will make tech firms and internet services take immediate action. If they see any fake video of Chadha, they want the power to have it taken down immediately. They don’t want to wait days or weeks to see who won. They only want to have the content removed from the Internet. Content and fabricated speeches are so fast spreading that there is not enough time for the usual legal processes to put out the fire.
Participating in a Very Long Line
Chadha isn’t the first one to do so. The Delhi High Court has become a hub for celebrities seeking to safeguard their online reputations.
Until recently, the right to be forgotten only applied to movie stars and athletes. People were using Anil Kapoor’s catchphrases and hence he went to court. Amitabh Bachchan has received an order to protect his legendary baritone voice. Similar protection has been sought by MS Dhoni, Sachin Tendulkar and even spiritual leaders. They didn’t want random companies taking advantage of their popularity and trying to exploit or sell low-quality products.
However, lately some politicians began paying attention to this legal instrument. Congress MP Shashi Tharoor recently filed a similar action to ban deepfakes that made him appear to be giving out controversial foreign policy remarks. The politicians know deepfakes are a huge danger to their political careers. An election can be ruined in a single night when a fake video is released that includes a leader accepting a bribe or insulting a certain community. It’s a much different game for elected officials than it is for an actor to lose an endorsement opportunity.
What is the difference between Satire and Theft?
Justice Prasad’s pushback reveals a big tug of war that’s going on at the moment. Malicious identity theft and regular political satire are extremely difficult to distinguish.
Politicians have always been the butt of jokes. For more than a century cartoonists have made caricatures of leaders. Of course, a teenager in a basement can now make an AI video of something rather than a drawing. The medium changed. The intent might be the same.
In Chadha’s plea, he says that this new technology is too risky to overlook. The cartoon is a well-known joke. An artificial voice reading a fake speech sounds very real. But it’s no longer discernible to the public. Which is why politicians feel so vulnerable. Once a deepfake becomes viral, they have no means of controlling the story. The algorithms drive controversial stuff up the to-do list, and reward the same sort of fake videos that politicians are going to try and remove from the internet.
