Training on generative AI for Equity caseworkers
Equity is the UK trade union for performers and creative workers. Its Greenfield Organising team supports members working in sectors such as audio, video games, commercials and modelling.
More and more performers are going to their union worried that generative AI is being used on their work. Typical concerns include:
- self-tapes being kept by casting directors or production companies
- old work being reused for AI under broad rights assignments signed years ago
- face and body scans taken for visual effects being stored with no explanation
- voices or likenesses being used to make synthetic content without consent
These queries are often treated as copyright problems, and many members think they have no options once their rights have been signed away. But a performer’s image, voice and motion capture recordings are usually personal data. That means UK data protection law can give them rights even where copyright does not. Many of the Equity staff handling these queries were new to the area.
Equity commissioned AWO to design and deliver a full-day training session that would equip its case workers and organisers to recognise and support members with generative AI queries.
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Built around real queries
AWO worked with Equity to build the training around the issues members raise most often. Case workers received a short pre-reading document before the day.
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Rights and contracts
Interactive sessions covered the legal landscape, the GDPR rights available to performers, how intellectual property assignments interact with data protection consent, and the contract terms to watch for. Around 16 to 18 staff, from assistants and officials to organisers, worked through the issues in pairs and small groups.
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From learning to action
The day ended with a practical process for investigating and advising on members’ queries, followed by a knowledge check. Afterwards, AWO gave the team a case worker reference pack to use and annotate in their day-to-day work.
Our biggest takeaway from this work was that data protection law is underused in protecting performers. Many queries that seem to be about copyright also involve personal data, and that can open up practical routes such as finding out how recordings have been used, objecting to further use, asking for deletion, or challenging consent that was never properly given.
Free advice for performers and creatives. AWO offers free, confidential, no-obligation 30-minute consultations to UK-based performers and creatives who are worried their voice, face or performance may have been used for AI without proper authorisation. Topics include digital replicas, body and face scans, voice cloning, archive footage being reused, and “AI consent” or “future technologies” clauses.
To discuss training for your organisation, or the use of performers’ data in AI, contact Alex Lawrence-Archer.