Denmark Deepfake Bill: Consent Rules for AI Faces and Voices

Denmark plans to put forward legislation on Thursday that would outlaw distributing realistic deepfakes of a person's face and voice without their permission. The change would be made to the country's copyright law.

The protection would cover ordinary members of the public as well as creative professionals, including against synthetic reproductions of what those professionals perform. In other words, an AI-generated imitation of a performer's work would fall under the rules, not just a fake of someone's likeness.

Culture minister Zenia Stampe said AI makes it possible to produce manipulated videos and images in moments and then spread them through social platforms. She described a central aim of the proposal as compelling major technology companies to remove altered material swiftly, so that the damage it causes is kept to a minimum.

Stampe expects the measure to come into force at the beginning of 2027.

The article places the move in a wider context: nations around the world are contending with the swift expansion of AI, and Denmark's proposal is one national response. For readers in Denmark and the Nordics, it signals an approach that uses copyright law to give people control over their own faces and voices, and that puts the burden of fast removal on large platforms. The excerpt does not detail penalties or how the removal requirement would be enforced.