Legal scholar proposes “right to delete” dead relatives’ digital data

Legal scholar Victoria Haneman is proposing that families of deceased individuals should have the right to delete their loved ones’ digital data to prevent AI-powered “digital resurrection.” Her argument, published in the Boston College Law Review, addresses a growing concern as AI technology increasingly enables the recreation of dead people’s voices, personalities, and likenesses without family consent.

Why this matters: Current privacy and publicity laws offer inadequate protection against unauthorized AI recreation of deceased individuals, leaving families vulnerable to potentially distressing digital resurrections of their loved ones.

The legal gaps: Existing laws fail to address AI-based recreation of the deceased in several key areas.

• The right to publicity, which protects against unauthorized commercial use of someone’s name or likeness, only applies to dead people in about 25 states and covers only commercial use.
• US privacy law limitations mean only Idaho, Nevada, and Oklahoma criminalize defamation and libel of the dead.
• The Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act (RUFADAA) allows family access to social media accounts but doesn’t prevent data scraping based on a dead person’s online presence.
• California’s Delete Act gives consumers data deletion rights but has “uncertain application to the deceased.”

Real-world examples: AI resurrection is already happening across various contexts.

• A programmer used OpenAI’s GPT-3 to recreate their deceased fiancée’s voice and personality.
• AI companion app Replika has been used to create chatbots based on dead friends’ personalities.
• Dead celebrities like TV chef Anthony Bourdain have appeared in commercially released documentaries through AI-generated voices.

What experts are saying: Haneman, a professor at the University of Georgia School of Law, emphasizes the urgency of addressing this legal gap.

• “Death is a legally significant event giving rise to different interests and entitlements, and the deceased user should not be an afterthought for big tech or policymakers,” she stated.

Industry awareness: The digital resurrection issue is gaining mainstream attention, with Hollywood star Samuel L. Jackson advising future actors to cross out “in perpetuity” clauses in contracts when asked to submit complete digital scans of their faces and bodies.