Voice actor Wendel Bezerra filed a report with the police on the grounds that his voice was used illegally with artificial intelligence.

voice actor Wendel Bezerra yesterday (29) registered a police report at a police station in São Paulo due to artificial intelligence (AI). More specifically it You reported a service that was abusing your service sound.

According to Bezerra’s Instagram account, when she was hired, she filed a complaint against a man who owned some sort of digital store that provided AI-generated voices of himself and other voice actors.

“It uses artificial intelligence so that our voice can be used for everything. The guy, Mr. Zezinho, owns a mattress store, so he goes, buys my voice from this guy, and then a voiceover comes out that includes my voice,” he explains.

As Wendel himself points out, this can be classified as fraud and embezzlementespecially because the material contains commercialized products and fake endorsements. This is different from ads where he or she authorizes the use of quotes or records from scratch.

“I did not allow my voice to be used. (…) Anyone who uses our voice inappropriately is committing a crime“, he reinforces. Wendel is responsible for the Brazilian voice of iconic characters such as Goku, SpongeBob, Cake Boss and Jackie Chan in a cartoon. He is also the dubbing director and the founder of Unidub studio.

According to the post, other voice actors are also calling the police on similar cases.

Voice actors and artificial intelligence

At the end of the message on Instagram, Wendel goes back to talking about a recurring theme in the category: The importance of legislation regulating the use of artificial intelligence in Brazil as well as its relationship with dubbing – both for the establishment of commercial contracts and to combat and punish cases of “audio deepfake”, which is widely used in fraud or unregulated trading.

“It’s important to think about this Today we’re talking about voice actors, but tomorrow it could be anyone.. They may be using your voice, your image, to market inappropriately,” Bezerra concludes.

He says he does not complain against various content, usually in a humorous tone or in homage to its dubbing; However, he says that not all professionals in this field may have the same reaction.

At the beginning of this year, audio professionals in Brazil launched a campaign to highlight these risks, gain public support, and try to codify them in the form of legislation.