Independent Protection Path of Commercial Voice Right in the AI Era: Comparative Research on Chinese Personality Right and the U.S. Publicity Right

Abstract

Now generative AI's speech synthesis has become widely used, so the law is no longer regarded as having the nature of human voice. Sound is data that can be extracted, saved and traded. In China, disputes arising from unauthorized reproduction of sound are increasing year by year. Nowadays, Civil Code uses similar rules of portrait rights to protect sound, which is not in line with the original auditory biological characteristics of sound. The court has different opinions on which standard to use, and it is often difficult for the complainant to bear the burden of proof, and the compensation for business losses is often insufficient. This paper combines case analysis and comparative study. On the one hand, it investigates the typical judgments of domestic AI voice infringement cases, and on the other hand, it studies how the U.S right of publicity manages the dignitary and commercial proprietary interests of the voice separately. It is unrealistic to take the American system as it is. Therefore, the paper puts forward a dual mechanism suitable for local conditions: the basic rule of independent business voice right is defined as Civil. It is stipulated in the Code that in order to punish the hidden unfair behavior, Anti-Unfair Competition Law is used. In this way, the interests related to the two sounds can be protected at different levels. Protecting personal dignity and keeping the vitality of digital innovation can be done together.