Mumbai: Actor Shilpa Shetty has approached the Bombay High Court seeking urgent protection of her personality and publicity rights, alleging large-scale misuse of her identity through artificial intelligence (AI) tools, deepfake technology, and other digital manipulation. She claims her name, image, likeness, voice, and other personal attributes are being commercially exploited without her consent.

In her petition, filed through advocate Sana Raees Khan, Shetty asserted that her “personality and publicity rights” — which include her name, image, voice, signature and overall identity — were being exploited without consent.

The plea states that numerous online platforms have been using her persona for commercial benefit, promotions, and other clandestine gains. These include websites allegedly publishing misleading or unauthorised content leveraging her popularity.

“The misuse of the actor’s image and identity has reached a point where legal intervention became imperative,” advocate Khan said. She added that no platform can “weaponise her identity for clandestine commercial gain”.

Shetty has sought a direction restraining such misuse and requested the High Court to protect her personality rights from further infringement. The matter will be listed for hearing in due course.

Courts have previously acknowledged and protected the publicity rights of public figures. Both the Bombay and Delhi High Courts have granted similar reliefs to several actors in the past, strengthening the jurisprudence around personality rights in India.