Morgan Freeman slams 'unauthorised' use of his voice for AI 'scam' (2024)

‘Uncle Mo’: Morgan Freeman’s AI voice

Freeman has been acting for five decades and his distinctive voice has been used to narrate several movies and shows, including the Netflix docuseries Life on Our Planet and the 2004 film Million Dollar Baby.

It is believed that Freeman’s post is referring to a TikTok user named Justine (@justinescameraroll). The Los Angeles-based influencer, who has nearly 220,000 followers on TikTok and over 124,000 on Instagram, has posted several videos using the AI imitation of Freeman’s voice.

Posting a video titled “a day in the life of a nepo niece” one week ago, Justine pretended to be Freeman’s niece and used the AI imitation of his voice to narrate a video of her travel experiences in Spain.

“Uncle Mo has been booked and busy, but i finally got him to narrate my trip! ... EMBEZZLED!?” Justine captioned the video, which has received over 35,000 likes and 250,000 views since it was uploaded.

Justine intended for her TikTok to be a joke and wrote “#ai” at the end of her caption, but not everyone caught on.

Jahelis Castillo stumbled across the video on TikTok and reshared it on her X account (@JahelisWasHere). She told her followers that Justine’s “uncle is Morgan Freeman and she gets him to narrate her day in the life vlogs. She wins at life and content creating. This is such a flex.”

Castillo’s repost went viral, attracting nearly 215,000 likes, thousands of reposts, and over 16.5 million views. She later learnt that Freeman’s narration was made using AI and posted a warning under the video.

Castillo likely brought increased attention to Justine’s videos by purporting that it was Freeman’s voice and referring to her as his niece. Freeman was alerted to the AI-narrated TikTok and wrote his statement on X, with the media then catching on to the AI “scam”.

After she found herself on Daily Mail, Justine posted a new video to clear the air, claiming she was “having a little bit of fun” and thought that the videos “would be funny” for others.

“I thought that it was very obvious that this was a joke... And now Uncle Mo is upset with me!” Justine explained to viewers.

“If anyone from his team is watching, I am so sorry ... I really just thought it was funny,” she added. “Please no cease and desist. Please no cease and desist.”

Justine fell short of apologising for any offence she might have made to Freeman, instead telling viewers to “use your discernment online” when interacting with content.

Celebrities increasingly dealing with AI imitation

Freeman is not the only household name dealing with privacy issues arising from the expanding capabilities of AI.

Last month, actress Scarlett Johansson’s legal team said they would take action against OpenAI for creating an AI imitation of her voice unless they revealed how the voice was constructed in the first place.

Johansson had been approached by OpenAI’s founder Sam Altman in September last year. The company wanted to use the 39-year-old actress’ voice as one of the models for ChatGPT’s new “Voice Mode” feature, an offer that she declined.

“He told me that he felt that by my voicing the system, I could bridge the gap between tech companies and creatives and help consumers to feel comfortable with the seismic shift concerning humans and AI. He said he felt that my voice would be comforting to people,” Johansson said in a statement. “After much consideration and for personal reasons, I declined the offer. Nine months later, my friends, family and the general public all noted how much the newest system named ‘Sky’ sounded like me.”

Despite declining Altman’s request, OpenAI’s new “Sky” voice sounded eerily similar to Johannson’s, and she was compelled to take action against the company.

“When I heard the released demo, I was shocked, angered and in disbelief that Mr. Altman would pursue a voice that sounded so eerily similar to mine that my closest friends and news outlets could not tell the difference,” Johannson said.

“As a result of their actions, I was forced to hire legal counsel, who wrote two letters to Mr. Altman and OpenAI, setting out what they had done and asking them to detail the exact process by which they created the ‘Sky’ voice,” she added.

OpenAI denied claims it had deliberately imitated Johannson’s voice for its new ChatGPT feature. However, they took down Sky’s voice after Johansson threatened legal action.

“We believe that AI voices should not deliberately mimic a celebrity’s distinctive voice — Sky’s voice is not an imitation of Scarlett Johansson but belongs to a different professional actress using her own natural speaking voice,” the company wrote in a blog post. “To protect their privacy, we cannot share the names of our voice talents.”