New York Senate Bill 7676B regulates contracts for the creation and use of digital replicas. This law took effect on January 1, 2025. The law defines “digital replica” as “a digital simulation of the voice or likeness of an individual” which, to an average person, “so closely resembles” the voice or likeness of the individual such that the likeness is virtually indistinguishable from the “authentic” version. N.Y. Gen. Oblig. Law § 5-302(2).

Specifically, the law voids any contract for the creation and use of a digital replication of the performance of an individual which “meets all of the following conditions”: (1) allows for the “creation and use of a digital replica” of an individual’s voice or likeness “in place of work the individual would otherwise have performed in person”; (2) does not include a “reasonably specific description of the intended use of the digital replica”; and (3) was negotiated with an individual who was not represented by legal counsel or a labor union. See N.Y. Gen. Oblig. Law § 5-302(1)(C). In other words, contracts that suffer from two or fewer of these conditions will not be voided under this law.

New York’s digital replica law regulates risks associated with AI, which unions have tried to address already through collective bargaining, a process where a union negotiates with employers on behalf of its members with respect to terms and conditions of employment. In recent years, many unions that represent performers in the entertainment industry, such as SAG-AFTRA, have expressed concerns that AI-generated replicas of performers could replace the performers themselves. In fact, SAG-AFTRA has instituted guiding principles¹ for the use of AI, which provide for, among other things:

• A performer’s right to consent to or prohibit the creation of a digital replica
• A performer’s right to negotiate limitations on the uses of a digital replica
• Safe storage and protection of digital replications of a performer’s voice, likeness and performance
• Appropriate compensation for the use of AI content 

SAG-AFTRA, which represents roughly 160,000 actors, dancers, singers, and other media professionals across the country, addressed the use of AI in its most recent agreement with Hollywood studios, which was ratified by its members on December 5, 2023. The memorandum of agreement, in effect from November 9, 2023 through June 30, 2026, modifies the existing collective bargaining agreement and requires that AI-generated likenesses or performances of SAG-AFTRA members are subject to certain limitations, and gives the union the right to meet twice a year with each studio to discuss the studio’s plans to use AI.²

While New York’s new digital replica law is the first of its kind in the state, it raises the possibility that the state could turn to regulating the use of AI in other industries affecting a variety of workers. For example, the phrase “digital replica” also appears in the recently enacted New York State Fashion Workers Act, which defines the term as a computer-generated or enhanced representation of a model’s likeness.