Polish Actors and Voiceover Artists Form Coalition Against AI Voice Theft

Poland's three largest organizations representing actors, voiceover artists and dubbing professionals have joined forces against the unauthorized use of their voices by artificial intelligence. The Związek Artystów Scen Polskich (ZASP, Polish Stage Artists' Union), the Związek Zawodowy Twórców Dubbingu (ZZTD, Dubbing Artists' Trade Union) and the Związek Zawodowy Aktorów Polskich (ZZAP, Polish Actors' Trade Union) announced the launch of the "My Voice. My Property" coalition and sent a list of concrete demands to the legislative, executive and judicial branches of government.

The voiceover case that was the final straw

The catalyst for the coalition was the ongoing trial before the Regional Court in Warsaw involving Jarosław Łukomski, a well-known voiceover artist. A digital model of his voice was used, without his knowledge or consent, in an advertising spot for a company in the water and sewage sector that produces septic tanks. The case is precedent-setting, since no Polish court has yet ruled on whether cloning someone's voice without consent and using it commercially violates a creator's personal and economic rights.

For the acting community, the Łukomski case showed that voice identity theft is no longer a theoretical problem confined to Silicon Valley AI labs, but a real commercial practice on the Polish advertising market. A voice recorded once and made available online or in a database can be cloned and used in any production, without payment or the artist's knowledge.

The coalition's concrete demands

The signatories are calling for a requirement to obtain explicit consent for every use of a voice by AI tools. They are also demanding full transparency around training data sources, meaning an obligation to disclose whose recordings were used to train a given voice model.

Another demand is clear labeling of productions that use AI-generated voices, so audiences know they are not hearing a live actor. The coalition also wants the right to have voice data deleted from AI systems, similar to the right to be forgotten under RODO (Poland's GDPR implementation).

We understand that technology is developing faster than legislation, but the state cannot remain passive in the face of abuse. We need clear regulations that guarantee creators control over the use of their voice, fair compensation and protection against illegal copying - Jan Tomaszewicz, president of ZASP's Main Board

Money for people, not just algorithms

Beyond legal regulations, the coalition is calling for financial mechanisms to support the industry. This means a system of grants, subsidies or tax instruments that reward producers who use the work of live actors and voiceover artists in their projects instead of replacing them with generative AI.

This demand goes beyond copyright protection alone. The acting community points out that cost pressure is pushing some producers of ads, games and audiobooks toward synthetic voices even where the budget would allow for hiring a human, with the only motive being the speed and convenience of generating content without negotiating rates.

What this means for the Polish market

Poland's dubbing, voiceover and advertising production market is among the most developed in the region, which also makes it an attractive target for companies offering voice cloning. Without clear regulations, artists remain effectively defenseless against parties who can train a model on publicly available recordings and use it commercially, betting that the cost of a potential lawsuit will be lower than the savings on wages.

For advertising agencies and content producers, the Łukomski case is a warning sign. If the court rules that unauthorized voice cloning violates personal rights, it could open the door to similar lawsuits against other parties using synthetic voices without the original speaker's consent.

The coalition has announced further advocacy efforts directed at the government administration and parliament, hoping that Poland's regulations implementing the EU AI Act will be supplemented with detailed rules protecting the voice and image of performing artists.