Law / United States / 
New York
Right of privacy, use of a living person's name, portrait, picture, likeness, or voice for advertising or trade
In force.
An AI prohibited practices rule binding public and private bodies.
- Criminal exposure
- Yes
- Private right of action
- Yes
- Criminal exposure note
- Section 50 makes a use without the required written consent a misdemeanor.
- How the hook was established
- express
- What makes it apply
- Place of effect
- Obligation class
- Consent, Prohibition
- Audit expectation
- none
What it requires
- Do not use a living person's name, portrait, picture, likeness, or voice for advertising purposes or for the purposes of trade without first obtaining that person's written consent, or a minor's parent's or guardian's written consent (section 50).
- Obtain the written consent before the use begins: section 51 refers to consent "first obtained" in writing, and the protection is for a living person.
- Treat a use of the name, portrait, picture, likeness, or voice within New York as open to the civil action in section 51, which lets the person restrain the use and recover damages.
- Rely on the exceptions only where they fit: section 51 permits a sound recording's copyright owner to deal in the recording where the right was conferred in writing by the living person or the right holder, and permits use of an author's, composer's, or artist's name, portrait, picture, likeness, or voice with the productions they have sold or disposed of.
These lines are LexLint's reading of the law's text. Also read by: Lehrman v. Lovo, Inc., No. 1:24-cv-03770-JPO (S.D.N.Y. ) (recorded ).
In the frameworks
- NIST AI RMF
- MAP 3.3Targeted application scope is specified and documented based on the system’s capability, established context, and AI system categorization.
- NIST AI 600-1
- GAI-RISK-08Information Integrity
- GAI-RISK-11Obscene, Degrading, and/or Abusive Content
- MIT mitigations Draft
- NIST Privacy Framework
- CT.PO-P1Policies, processes, and procedures for authorizing data processing (e.g., organizational decisions, individual consent), revoking authorizations, and maintaining authorizations are established and in place.
- FINOS AIGF
- AIR-PREV-005System Acceptance Testing
- ETSI EN 304 223
Our reading of where this law's duties sit in each framework. It never says that running a control meets the law. How we read a framework against the law
Identifiers refer to ETSI EN 304 223 V2.1.1 (2025-12), © ETSI 2025, all rights reserved. ETSI owns the standard; no ETSI text (titles or sentences) is reproduced here. The standard is free to download from ETSI.
Who enforces it
Enforcement body
The person whose name, portrait, picture, likeness or voice is used, by an equitable action in the supreme court of this state to restrain the use under section 51.
Settledness
- As of
- Case link
- https://www.nysd.uscourts.gov/sites/default/files/2025-07/Lovo%20v%20Lehrman.pdf
- Case citation
- Lehrman v. Lovo, Inc., No. 1:24-cv-03770-JPO (S.D.N.Y. )
- Open questions
- Does the one-year limitations period for a section 51 claim restart each time a voice-cloning system generates new audio in a person's voice?
- Does "voice" in section 51 reach a synthetic voice that copies no single recording but is recognizable as a particular person?
- Does a use "for the purposes of trade" under section 51 include selling or licensing a model that can generate a person's voice or likeness, as opposed to publishing a work that uses it?
What record it asks for
Who may demand the log
Court
What the log must hold
Consent or opt-out state
Logging duty
Section 50 makes it a misdemeanor to use a living person's name, portrait, picture, likeness or voice for advertising or trade without first obtaining that person's written consent (a minor's parent or guardian's consent for a minor), and section 51 gives the person an action in the supreme court when it is used without the written consent first obtained. Neither section requires a log or a retention period. A user relying on consent cannot show it was given without the writing the statute requires.
- Kind
- Implicit
- As of
- Provision
- N.Y. Civ. Rights Law § 50 and § 51
- Trigger
- consent_or_optout
What this law does
Section 50 makes it a misdemeanor for a person, firm or corporation to use for advertising purposes, or for the purposes of trade, the name, portrait, picture, likeness, or voice of any living person without first obtaining the written consent of that person, or of a minor's parent or guardian.
Section 51 lets a person whose name, portrait, picture, likeness or voice is used within the state for advertising purposes or for the purposes of trade without that written consent maintain an equitable action in the supreme court to prevent and restrain the use, and sue to recover damages for any injuries sustained. If the defendant knowingly used the name, portrait, picture, likeness or voice in a manner forbidden by section 50, the jury may in its discretion award exemplary damages.
Section 51 does not prohibit the copyright owner of a sound recording from dealing in, licensing or selling that recording where the right to do so was conferred by contract or other written document by the living person or the holder of the right.
Section 51 also permits using the name, portrait, picture, likeness or voice of an author, composer or artist in connection with the literary, musical or artistic productions they have sold or disposed of with that name, portrait, picture, likeness or voice used in connection therewith. The provisions this entry describes came into force on different days.
How courts have read itPremium data
Our analysis of this law draws on 1 court ruling.
What each ruling held, what it means for an app, and whether it still stands are premium data, in the Plus, Pro and Enterprise plans.
When LexLint raises it
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