{"id":21899,"date":"2026-04-29T18:13:16","date_gmt":"2026-04-29T18:13:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/21899\/"},"modified":"2026-04-29T18:13:16","modified_gmt":"2026-04-29T18:13:16","slug":"taylor-swift-files-trademark-applications-for-her-voice-and-likeness-reportedly-to-curb-ai-threats","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/21899\/","title":{"rendered":"Taylor Swift files trademark applications for her voice and likeness reportedly to curb AI threats"},"content":{"rendered":"

NEW YORK (AP) \u2014 Taylor Swift<\/a> filed three new trademark applications with the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office, a move one legal expert theorizes it is to protect her voice and image from potential misuse through artificial intelligence.<\/p>\n

Two of the applications filed Friday are sound trademarks covering her voice, one of her saying \u201cHey, it\u2019s Taylor Swift,\u201d and the other is \u201cHey, it\u2019s Taylor.\u201d<\/p>\n

The third application is for a visual trademark, described in the filing as \u201ca photograph of Taylor Swift holding a pink guitar, with a black strap and wearing a multicolored iridescent bodysuit with silver boots. She is standing on a pink stage in front of a multicolored microphone with purple lights in the background.\u201d<\/p>\n

The filings were made on behalf on Swift\u2019s TAS Rights Management. All three have been approved and are currently awaiting assignment to an examining attorney.<\/p>\n

The Associated Press has reached out to a representative for Swift as well as Rebecca Liebowitz, partner at law firm Venable, who is listed as the attorney on the filings. Requests for comment were not immediately returned.<\/p>\n

News of Swift\u2019s new trademark filings made the rounds on Monday after first being noticed by intellectual property attorney Josh Gerben. In a blog post<\/a> shared Monday, Gerben theorized that the trademarks are \u201cspecifically designed to protect Taylor from threats posed by artificial intelligence,\u201d in response to growing concerns that AI could challenge celebrities\u2019 abilities to control their voices and likenesses without their consent.<\/p>\n

In his post, Gerben explained that \u201cRight of Publicity\u201d laws \u2014 which protect celebrities from having their images or likenesses used to sell products without their permission \u2014 offer some protection against unauthorized use of a celebrity\u2019s likeness, but trademark filings like Swift\u2019s can offer additional protection.<\/p>\n

Swift has been a target of AI misuse in the past. Pornographic deepfake images<\/a> of her have circulated online, making the singer the most famous victim of a scourge that tech platforms and antiabuse groups have struggled to fix<\/a>. In another instance, the superstar was shown in a fake endorsement of President Donald Trump during his 2024 campaign, which the then-candidate reposted and shared as genuine.<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cThe Life of a Showgirl\u201d<\/a> singer is not the only celebrity to pursue these kinds of trademarks. In January, attorneys for actor Matthew McConaughey secured eight trademarks from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office including a sound trademark of his catchphrase \u201cAlright, alright, alright.\u201d<\/p>\n

Attorneys for the entertainment law firm Yorn Levine, which represented McConaughey, told Variety the trademarks were filed in an attempt to protect his voice and likeness from unauthorized use by AI, and to protect him in developing new opportunities using AI.<\/p>\n

Last year, McConaughey made a deal with voice-cloning company ElevenLabs<\/a> that will allow its artificial intelligence technology to replicate his voice.<\/p>\n

Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NEW YORK (AP) \u2014 Taylor Swift filed three new trademark applications with the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":21900,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[24,25,5333,13585,15216,14191],"class_list":{"0":"post-21899","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ai","8":"tag-ai","9":"tag-artificial-intelligence","10":"tag-image","11":"tag-taylor-swift","12":"tag-trademark","13":"tag-voice"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21899","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21899"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21899\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21900"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21899"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21899"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21899"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}