You can’t libel the dead. But that doesn’t mean you should deepfake them.

Zelda Williams, daughter of the late actor Robin Williams, has a touching message for her father’s fans.

“Please, just stop sending my dad AI videos. Stop thinking I want to see him or will understand him. I don’t,” she wrote in an Instagram Story post on Monday. “If you have any decency, just stop doing it to me and me, until everyone stops. It’s stupid, it’s a waste of time and energy, and believe me, that’s not what he wants.”

It’s probably not a coincidence that Williams was moved to post this just days after the release of the Sora 2 Openai’s video prototype Sora The social app, which gives users the ability to generate highly realistic images Deepfakes for themselvesAnd their friends and some cartoon characters.

This also includes dead people, which seems fair because it is It is not illegal to defame a deceased personaccording to the Student Journalism Law Center.

Sora won’t let you create videos of living people — unless it’s yourself, or a friend has given you permission to use their likeness (or “Cameo,” as Openai calls it). But these limits do not apply to the dead, who can often be generated without roadblocks. The app, which is still only available via Invite, has been flooded with videos of historical figures like Martin Luther King, Jr., Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and Richard Nixon, as well as available celebrities like Bob Ross, John Lennon, Alex Trebek, and yes, Robin Williams.

How Openai draws the line on creating videos of the dead is unclear. Sora 2 will not spawn, say, former President Jimmy Carter, who died in 2024, or Michael Jackson, who died in 2009, though it did create videos with Robin Williams, who died in 2014, according to TechCrunch tests. Although Openai’s Cameo feature allows people to set instructions on how they can appear in videos others generate from it – the railings came in response to… Early criticism of Seurat – The deceased have no such say. I bet Richard Nixon would be rolling in his grave if he could see the depth I made of him advocating for police abolition.

Openai did not respond to TechCrunch’s request for comment on the death toll. However, dead celebrities like Williams are likely within acceptable company practices; Legal precedent He appears The company will likely not be liable for defaming the deceased.

“To watch the legacies of real people be condensed into ‘this looks vague and sounds like them so that’s enough,’” Williams wrote, “so that others can rid themselves of the terrible Tiktok plaguing their puppets.”

Openai’s critics blame the company A quick and material approach to such issueswhich is why Sora was quickly inundated with AI clips from copyrighted characters like Peter Griffin and Pikachu upon its release. CEO Sam Allman originally said that Hollywood studios and agencies would need to explicitly opt out if they did not want IP included in videos created by SORA. The Motion Picture Association has already called on Openai to take action on the issue, advertisement in a statement that “well-established copyright law protects the rights of creators and applies here.” He has since The company said it will reverse that position.

Perhaps, DeepFake’s most dangerous AI model is available to people yet, given how realistic its output is. Other platforms like XAI LAG are behind it, but have fewer guardrails than SORA, making it possible to generate porn Deep real people. As other companies catch up on Openai, we’ll be setting a terrible precedent if we treat real people – living or dead – like our own personal toys.