Preity Zinta granted interim relief in personality rights case; Bombay High Court orders removal of AI deepfakes and morphed content

Actress Preity Zinta is the latest Bollywood star to be granted interim relief by the Bombay High Court in a case over the unauthorised use of her image, which she claims 'violated her personality, publicity and moral rights'.Justice Madhav Jamdar passed the interim order on Wednesday while hearing a suit, observing that misuse of such content does affect a person’s fundamental rights, as reported by Bar and Bench.As per the report, Zinta sought protection against social media intermediaries and that they be directed to remove AI-generated deepfakes, morphed images and other content that allegedly infringe upon her personality and publicity rights.The court reminded online intermediaries of their obligation to exercise 'due diligence' under the Information Technology Rules governing digital platforms. Justice Jamdar also expressed concern over the role of intermediaries in curbing offensive and unlawful content.The actress, through her representative, solicitor Jai Munim, argued that 'deep fake images, AI and superimposed visuals and morphed pictures prima facie violated her moral, publicity and personality rights'. In her plea, Zinta requested the court to restrain the 'named and unnamed websites and people' from exploiting her image for commercial or personal gain. The petition specifically sought protection over the use of 'her name, nickname, photographs, likeness including her distinctive dimpled smile, caricature, voice, mannerisms, persona or other attributes of her personality in any form'.Zinta also expressed concern that AI-generated content and chatbot-style interactions impersonating her, were posted online by alleged infringers.Her suit further listed domain names in her name which she did not create. It said, “personality traits are an integral / intrinsic part of her personality rights and/or publicity rights, in which the Plaintiff exercises (and ought to exercise) exclusive control. “While granting the actress relief in the case, the High Court also stated that in the case of any future instances of infringement, Zinta may approach online intermediaries, including Google, Meta and X, seeking the removal of such content. Should the platforms fail to act, she would be at liberty to apply for appropriate orders again.Apart from her acting career, Zinta is also the co-owner of the Punjab Kings franchise in the Indian Premier League.Preity now joins a list of Bollywood stars like Amitabh Bachchan, Anil Kapoor, Salman Khan, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, Abhishek Bachchan, Jackie Shroff, Karan Johar, and many others, who have gone the legal route to protect their personality and publicity rights.