Deepfakes, Voice Clones, and Likeness

Short Answer

Texas law treats synthetic media differently depending on what it shows and how it is used. Sexual deepfakes of a real person made without written consent are a crime under Penal Code § 21.165 and support civil claims under Civil Practice and Remedies Code chapter 98B, including claims against websites, nudification apps and payment processors that facilitate them. Social media platforms must run complaint systems for explicit deepfakes. AI-generated material that appears to depict a child sexually is separately criminal. Election deepfakes are covered by Election Code § 255.004. Federal law adds the Tools to Address Known Exploitation by Immobilizing Technological Deepfakes on Websites and Networks Act (TAKE IT DOWN Act), which since May 19, 2026 requires covered platforms to remove nonconsensual intimate images within 48 hours of a valid request. Non-sexual uses of a person’s voice or likeness, such as a cloned voice in an advertisement, are governed by publicity, false endorsement, consumer protection and telemarketing law rather than by a single deepfake statute.

Which Laws Apply

Texas AI-specific: Penal Code § 21.165 and Civil Practice and Remedies Code chapter 98B (SB 441); Business and Commerce Code chapter 120 (HB 3133); SB 20; HB 581; Business and Commerce Code § 552.057 (TRAIGA, the Texas Responsible Artificial Intelligence Governance Act); Election Code § 255.004 (AI-specific provision within the generally applicable Election Code).

Generally applicable Texas law: Election Code § 255.004; Civil Practice and Remedies Code chapter 98B (AI-specific provisions within the generally applicable Civil Practice and Remedies Code); Property Code chapter 26 (deceased persons); common law misappropriation; the Deceptive Trade Practices-Consumer Protection Act (DTPA).

Federal: TAKE IT DOWN Act, Pub. L. 119-12; the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) for cloned voices in calls; Lanham Act false endorsement.

Sexual Deepfakes

SB 441 rewrote Penal Code § 21.165. A person commits an offense by knowingly producing or distributing, by electronic means, “deep fake media” that appears to show a person with computer-generated intimate parts, or with another person’s intimate parts presented as theirs, or engaging in sexual conduct the person did not engage in, without the person’s effective consent. Consent counts only if the person signed a plain-language written agreement describing the media. The offense is a Class A misdemeanor, and a third-degree felony for a repeat offender or where the person depicted is a minor. Threatening to produce or distribute such media to coerce, extort, harass or intimidate is a separate offense. A disclaimer that the content is fake is not a defense.

The statute provides affirmative defenses for law enforcement and legal proceedings, for internet and communications providers acting only as conduits, and for providers of publicly accessible AI software that prohibit such content in their terms, require users to accept those terms, and take specified technological steps to prevent its creation. AI developers that offer image or video generation should read those conditions closely.

Civil Claims and Site Duties

Civil Practice and Remedies Code chapter 98B, as amended, lets a depicted person sue anyone who produced, solicited, disclosed or promoted the material without consent and with intent to harm, if the person was harmed and identified. It also reaches the owner of a website or app that recklessly facilitates the material for payment, the owner of a publicly accessible nudification app, and a person who recklessly processes payments for such material. Site owners must provide an easy removal-request process, remove material within 72 hours of a request and make reasonable efforts to remove identical copies; failing those duties is a deceptive trade practice, and the Attorney General may seek injunctions against repeat violators. Claimants may proceed under a confidential identity, and the limitations period runs 10 years from the later of discovery or the person’s 18th birthday.

Platform Complaint Systems

HB 3133 amended Business and Commerce Code § 120.102(b). After a report of explicit deepfake material, a social media platform must immediately confirm awareness to the reporting user, remove the reported material and known identical copies, and provide a written status update within seven days. Business and Commerce Code § 120.1025 allows restoration if the platform determines the material is not an explicit deepfake; if it is, the platform must take measures against reposting the same material. The seven-day deadline is for the update, not a seven-day permission to leave the material online. Chapter 98B’s separate 72-hour duty and the federal 48-hour duty require their own analysis.

The federal TAKE IT DOWN Act imposes a parallel duty on covered platforms: remove nonconsensual intimate images, including digital forgeries, within 48 hours of a valid request and make reasonable efforts to remove identical copies. The duty became enforceable May 19, 2026, and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) began enforcement that month. A platform serving Texas users should build one process that satisfies both clocks.

Children

TRAIGA (Business and Commerce Code § 552.057) prohibits specified systems intended to produce unlawful sexual material and systems intentionally made to simulate sexual conversations while impersonating a child. Penal Code § 43.235, added by SB 20, addresses knowing possession, promotion or access with intent to view obscene visual material appearing to depict a child; its definitions and exceptions matter. HB 581 adds adult access verification for covered publicly accessible sexual-material tools and requires a real source individual to be an adult who consented (Civil Practice and Remedies Code §§ 129B.002(a-1), 129B.003 and 129B.0045). Civil Practice and Remedies Code § 129B.002(a-2) contains an exception with several conditions; it is not a general exception for any tool labeled AI.

Elections

Election Code § 255.004 prohibits the specified creation and publication of a deepfake video with intent to injure a candidate or influence an election within 30 days of election day. The failed 2025 SB 893 proposal did not broaden that enacted text to all altered images and audio. A political call using a cloned voice can also fall within the TCPA’s artificial-voice provisions. the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) 24-17 interprets those provisions; it does not make every political message unlawful.

Voices and Likeness Outside the Sexual Context

Property Code chapter 26 gives specified post-death rights in a person’s name, voice, signature, photograph and likeness, generally for 50 years after death, subject to its conditions and exceptions. Living-person disputes can implicate common-law misappropriation and federal false endorsement as well as deceptive marketing. Brown v. Ames, 201 F.3d 654 (5th Cir. Feb. 7, 2000), affirmed Texas name-and-likeness misappropriation claims by musicians whose names and likenesses were used to market recordings. The court rejected a Copyright Act preemption defense because a person's name and likeness are not copyrightable and the state-law tort protects a different interest. It was not an AI or cloned-voice case. Permission to use one recording does not necessarily authorize a synthetic endorsement in a different context.

Illustrative Example (Hypothetical)

A synthetic voice advertisement requires separate analysis of the content, permission and delivery method. Texas likeness claims can protect identity under Brown v. Ames, while covered AI-voice calls are subject to the TCPA and FCC 24-17. The sexual-material and election provisions have narrower statutory elements; the label deepfake alone does not establish that one of those offenses occurred.

What Is Unsettled

Coverage, intent, consent and the requested remedy must be tested under each statute. A platform can have several removal obligations with different triggers and deadlines. Constitutional and federal-preemption arguments are separate from whether a report meets the statutory elements.