Tokyo Court Says Unauthorized Commercial Voice Use Can Violate Performers’ Rights

A performer’s voice can receive legal protection against unauthorized commercial exploitation, Tokyo District Court ruled on September 30, 2026. The decision came in actor Kenjiro Tsuda’s challenge to AI-narrated TikTok videos. But recognition of that right did not bring the removal order he sought: the videos had already been deleted.

The court placed voices within publicity rights, which let people control and profit from commercially valuable aspects of their identity. The Guardian describes the judgment as Japan’s first ruling recognizing that protection for a human voice. Its reach comes with an important condition: the use must be exclusively aimed at exploiting the voice’s commercial appeal.

An anonymous account, a recognizable performance

Tsuda is best known for voicing Kento Nanami in the anime Jujutsu Kaisen. His case concerned 188 videos uploaded to an anonymous TikTok account between July 2024 and September 2025. He said their narration reproduced his distinctive, deep baritone, describing the voice as “lustrous.”

The account paired images with AI-generated speech about urban legends, the occult and conspiracy theories. Its profile picture resembled Tsuda’s Jujutsu Kaisen character. At one point, it had more than 200,000 subscribers, giving the dispute a substantial audience as well as a question of vocal resemblance.

Tsuda’s lawyers described the content as “sordid” and argued that the account attracted attention because it copied a popular actor’s appealing voice. Their case connected the alleged imitation to the account’s audience: the voice was not merely similar, they argued, but the reason people watched.

TikTok disputed whose voice viewers heard

TikTok countered that the narration used a “generic male voice” and that perceived similarities to Tsuda were highly subjective. That defense challenged the identification at the heart of his complaint, rather than accepting that the account had used his voice without permission.

An Anadolu Agency report, citing Kyodo News, also relayed the anonymous poster’s explanation: the AI had been trained using a friend’s voice. That was the poster’s account, not an established finding about the training material. The parties therefore offered competing explanations for what the synthetic narration represented.

Tsuda filed his lawsuit in November 2025. The videos were subsequently deleted, which became decisive for his request that TikTok’s operator remove them. On September 30, the court dismissed that request because the material was already gone, while recognizing that unauthorized use of a performer’s voice can infringe publicity rights.

The unauthorised use of a performer’s voice … can be considered an infringement on publicity rights

Aya Takahashi, presiding judge, Tokyo District Court

Protection rests on commercial appeal

Judge Aya Takahashi described a voice as “as symbolic of one’s personality as portraits are.” That comparison explains the legal mechanism: protection attaches to identity and its commercial appeal, rather than treating a voice as only a sound. The court’s stated condition is not a blanket prohibition on every vocal imitation.

The ruling also arrives amid Japanese legal guidance addressing synthetic voices on social media. According to the Anadolu Agency report, Japan’s Justice Ministry has issued guidelines saying that uploading videos using voices similar to real people, and generating revenue from them, may constitute a rights violation. The report says Japan lacks clear laws specifically stipulating voice rights.

TikTok’s next move remains under consideration. The company said it would respect the judgment while scrutinizing its details and deciding what steps to take. It also pledged to keep working on the balance between technology development and rights protection. Its response did not specify a concrete policy change.