US audiobook narrators sue Google for ‘using their voices in AI training’ - The Bookseller
Audiobook narrators and journalists are suing Google, alleging the company used their voices without consent to train AI models, violating biometric privacy laws.
- Incident date
- May 2026
- Target
- Lindsey Dorcus, Victoria Nassif, Carol Marin, Philip Rogers, Alison Flowers, Robin Amer and Yohance Lacour
In May 2026, a class action lawsuit was filed against Google by audiobook narrators, podcasters, and journalists alleging unauthorized use of their voices to train AI models. The plaintiffs claim Google violated the Biometric Information Privacy Act by using their voiceprints without consent.
What happened
The lawsuit alleges that Google ingested hundreds of thousands of hours of human speech to create foundational models for products like Gemini Live and YouTube auto-dubbing. The plaintiffs, including audiobook narrators and journalists, claim their voices were among those used to extract unique biometric signatures, or voiceprints. They argue that Google's AI products now compete with them in the markets where they earn their living, offering services like audiobook narration and audio journalism at a fraction of the cost of human labor. The suit specifically mentions Google Cloud Text-to-Speech being licensed to audiobook publishers, NotebookLM Audio Overviews generating podcast-format audio, and YouTube auto-dubbing replacing voiceover work.