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The
Tokyo District Court's decision Wednesday was the first
acknowledgment of the right to one's voice in Japan. The ruling
was good news for many anime voice actors at a time when they
are increasingly concerned about the use of AI-generated
versions of their voices on social media.
The plaintiff, Kenjiro Tsuda, is an actor best known for his
“lustrous and deep” voice in starring characters such as Kento
Nanami in “Jujutsu Kaisen,” a popular anime series.
In his lawsuit, Tsuda said that the anonymous operator of the
TikTok account “Nanami" wrongfully profited by attracting
viewers with his voice narrating in more than 180 videos about
urban legends and paranormal phenomena, and asked for the
material to be deleted.
“The human voice is symbolic of individual personality, just
like one's portrait," Presiding Judge Aya Takahashi said,
according to a court document seen by The Associated Press.
It is appropriate to consider the unauthorized use with an
obvious intention to take advantage of the commercial appeal of
Tsuda's voice “an infringement of publicity rights,” Takahashi
said.
As of November 2025, the account had more than 200,000
subscribers, with viewers often noting the similarities between
the narrator's voice and Tsuda's.
The defendant argued that the videos used AI-generated voice
that sounded like Tsuda's but was not his, and that the videos
did not damage the actor's reputation as a voice actor.
The ruling dismissed Tsuda's demand that all the videos using
his voice be deleted, because the account had already been
closed.
Wednesday's decision comes at a time of growing concern among
Japanese voice actors about the AI cloning of their trademark
voices in anime.
In 2024, OpenAI announced plans to halt the use of one of its
ChatGPT voices after “Her” actor Scarlett Johansson said it
sounded “eerily similar” to her own.
Last year, Oscar-winning actors Michael Caine and Matthew
McConaughey made deals with voice-cloning company ElevenLabs to
allow its AI technology to replicate their voices.
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