Anger from voice actors as NSFW mods use AI deepfakes to replicate their voices: 'This is NOT okay.'

Harvey Randall
·2 min read
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An image of the Dragonborn from Skyrim, staring into the camera with glowing eyes.
An image of the Dragonborn from Skyrim, staring into the camera with glowing eyes.

A slew of pornographic mods on the Nexus Mods website has caused mounting anger in the voice acting community. As reported by Gamesradar, Twitter user Robbie92_ has posted a list of Skyrim voice actors who have had their voices used against their will for NSFW mods, earlier this week.

The Tweet reads: With the rise of AI voice cloning, voice actors are being abused by the modding communities. As a member of the Skyrim modding scene, I am deeply concerned at the practice of using AI voice cloning to create and distribute non-consensual deepfake pornographic content.
The Tweet reads: With the rise of AI voice cloning, voice actors are being abused by the modding communities. As a member of the Skyrim modding scene, I am deeply concerned at the practice of using AI voice cloning to create and distribute non-consensual deepfake pornographic content.

These actors include April Stewart, who in addition to multiple characters in Skyrim, is the voice of Petra Venj in Destiny 2 and Jessamine Kaldwin in Dishonoured 2; Jon Curry, who voiced Zevran in Dragon Age: Origins; and Susan Eisenberg, who has voiced Wonder Woman in both animation and video games since 2001.

The National Association of Voice Actors tweeted in response: "The damage to voice actors and game companies by AI and synthetic voices is real and tangible," proceeding to tag both Bethesda Studios and Zenimax Online, writing: "voice actors don't have the legal ability to fight this, but you can help."

The wider voice acting community has also rallied to decry the mods. Linsay Rousseau of Transformers: War for Cybertron, Deathloop, and Fallout 76 quote tweeted: "Voice Actors don't consent to this. If you're using these mods, you're stealing & abusing our work."

Jennifer Hale, voice of Commander Shepard in the Mass Effect Series, also tweeted: "to make this CRYSTAL clear: if you do not have written permission to use my voice, you DO NOT HAVE PERMISSION to use my voice, including AI use."

Meanwhile Abbey Veffer, who voices a host of characters in The Elder Scrolls Online and Genshin Impact, wrote: "I do not, and never will, consent to my voice being used for AI synthesis, cloning, deepfakes, etc. This is NOT okay."

Robbie92_ has also been doing considerable work via a google document to assemble a list of mods "that use AI cloning to produce non-consensual pornographic content" for the purposes of spreading awareness and reporting them, an exhaustive task that April Stewart thanked them for. "The Google doc was particularly helpful when I contacted my agent and also requested the content be taken down."

I reached out to Robbie92_ to ask about their work, and I'll update this article if I hear back from them.

Voice actors clearly shouldn't have to spend hours of their day browsing Nexus Mods just to protect themselves, and I can't even imagine the amount of time, money, and labour that would need to be poured into fighting this kind of AI use en-masse, and Nexus Mods' current attitude towards AI-generated work on their platform doesn't make matters easier.

They've stated these mods "may be removed if we receive a credible complaint from an affected creator/rights holder", but considering there's an entire live document dedicated to tracking these things, I can't see that being a satisfying solution for anybody involved.