The Tokyo District Court has ruled that voice actor Kenjiro Tsuda’s voice is protected under Japan’s right of publicity, in a case that marks the first time a Japanese court has extended that protection to a person’s voice rather than just their name or likeness.
Tsuda filed the lawsuit in November 2025 after discovering that numerous videos on TikTok used AI-generated narration mimicking his voice. He requested that the videos be taken down, but TikTok refused, prompting him to take the matter to court. According to the TV Asahi program “Morning Show,” which covered the ruling on its October 1 broadcast, the person who posted the videos was earning roughly 700,000 yen a month in ad revenue tied to the clips’ view counts.
In its decision, the Tokyo District Court stated that a person’s voice, like their name or image, serves as “a symbol of individual personality,” and found that using it without permission can constitute an infringement of publicity rights. Publicity rights in Japan protect public figures from having their name or likeness exploited commercially without consent, and this ruling is the first to confirm that unauthorized AI voice cloning can fall under the same protection.
“Morning Show” noted that the ruling could be significant for anyone who makes a living with their voice, Tsuda included. The program also raised a trickier question it left open: what this means for professional impressionists (ものまね芸人), whose entire act revolves around imitating celebrities’ voices, and whether the value of their live impersonations will now be judged differently from AI-generated clones.
Who is Kenjiro Tsuda?
Kenjiro Tsuda (津田健次郎) is a Japanese voice actor and narrator known for his distinctively deep, calm voice. His anime roles include Hawks in “My Hero Academia” and Decim in “Death Parade,” and he is also one of Japan’s most in-demand narrators for television commercials, documentaries, and variety programs. Outside the booth, he’s active on social media, including the Instagram account referenced in this case, 2_da_ken.
Author’s Comment
Honey, a judge just told TikTok that a voice is a person’s property, and I am here for it. For years we’ve all just shrugged while deepfake tech ran wild because the law hadn’t caught up — well, now it has, at least a little. But let’s not pretend this is simple: Japan has an entire beloved entertainment tradition built on people doing OTHER people’s voices for a living, and this ruling doesn’t draw a neat line between "illegal AI clone" and "guy at a variety show doing a spot-on impression for laughs." That’s the real fight coming next, and I suspect a lot of ものまね芸人 are watching this case very nervously right now. For Tsuda, though? Deserved win. Your voice is your instrument — nobody gets to borrow it without asking, least of all a robot.
