Background

With the rise of AI video generators and platforms collecting AI-generated videos, harms such as (s)extortion, bullying, and fraud have become apparent, fuelling debate on how to protect citizens. In the summer of 2025, Denmark attracted international headlines with the government's announcement that it would tackle AI-generated deepfakes by protecting people's personal characteristics, including appearance and voice, through copyright law. The country promoted the approach during its Presidency of the Council of the EU in the second half of 2025.

The proposed amendments to the Danish Copyright Act notified to the European Commission are composed of two parts: general protection against realistic digitally generated imitations of personal characteristics; and protection against realistic digitally generated imitations of performers. They require consent from the person who is imitated to the making available of relevant content, with the protection lasting for 50 years after the death of that person. Enforcement would be governed by the EU Digital Services Act (DSA), which sets EU-wide rules on content moderation that cover detection, flagging and removal of illegal – including copyright-infringing – content, as defined either at EU or national level, to protect users from harm. The Danish draft law seeks to provide a legal basis for activating the relevant DSA procedures for non-authorised imitations, while expressions of caricature, satire, parody and pastiche are, in principle, excluded. The amendments are expected to enter into force in July 2026.

Reaction to the Danish proposal

Denmark's approach seeks to provide an enhanced legal basis for reporting harmful deepfakes. When users make a notification under the DSA notice and action mechanism (Article 16), they need to provide a precise and sufficiently substantiated explanation demonstrating the illegal nature of the content in question. Danish lawyers have supported the initiative's goal of increasing legal certainty for people who suffer harm from AI-generated deepfakes. The Danish Media Council for Children and Young People also considers that the amendments could strengthen victims' opportunities to have material taken down from digital platforms, in addition to the consent requirement having a preventive effect in the first place.

Other Member States have generally supported action in this field. The Declaration on the necessity of culture and media as a safeguard for our European democracies, agreed under the Danish Presidency, includes a guiding principle according to which 'Our citizens must be protected against digital replicas of their personal characteristics without consent'. It was signed by ministers from all the Member States – except for Hungary – and five other European countries. The Danish Minister of Culture stated that Ireland had announced that it intends to follow the planned Danish rules. However, when the protection of image, voice and likeness was addressed in the Danish Presidency's policy questionnaire, several Member States underlined that concerns linked to the production and dissemination of deepfakes extend beyond the remit of copyright law.

Indeed, the planned Danish rules do not constitute copyright in the strict sense. Copyright law typically protects artistic works, which are original and reflect the 'author's own intellectual creation', as specified by the Court of Justice of the European Union. Intangible aspects of personal characteristics such as voice and image considered in isolation would not naturally fall under this category. As is the case for photography, copyright ownership is usually attributed to the creator (i.e. the photographer), not the person represented. It also follows from the WIPO Copyright Treaty, the WTO 'TRIPS' Agreement and case law of the Court of Justice that copyright protection does not extend to 'ideas', nor does it apply when the expression of components is 'differentiated only by their technical function', without room for creative freedom. Targets of deepfakes are unlikely to be copyright owners of the input material of images or videos, which merely act as building blocks for creative compositions. In the explanatory notes annexed to the notified draft law, the Danish authorities, indeed, admit that they do not intend to designate a new right of copyright for citizens even if the amendments are included in the Copyright Act. Rather, there seems to be an attempt to supplement – and possibly codify – unwritten legal principles relating to private law personality rights.

Another concern relates to the creation of new rights on top of existing rules. Risks posed by deepfakes are currently addressed under various legal frameworks in the Member States and beyond. Besides copyright, relevant legal frameworks – as discussed in an international WIPO conference in October 2025 – include a blend of personality rights rooted in the human right to respect for private life (right of publicity, image rights, passing off, data protection, defamation), in addition to trademarks, unfair competition and trade secrets. Denmark itself has existing rules that could be applied to deepfakes, with the Criminal Code prohibiting, for example, identity theft and unjustified production of sexual material, while the Danish Marketing Practices Act provides protection against the unauthorised commercial use of personal images. The Danish authorities also identify the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the AI Act at Union level as being relevant. Furthermore, the Directive combating violence against women and domestic violence addresses non-consensual sharing of intimate images, including deepfakes. From a legal perspective, some experts have argued that, considering the existing possibilities, the approach to extending copyright protection may bring little added value, and that it may be worth focusing instead on enforcement.

Outlook

The Danish initiative has undoubtedly managed to bring more attention to the growing risks of deepfakes for the well-being of citizens. The draft law has been notified through the technical regulation information system and is open for comments until 3 February 2026. The initiative comes before the planned review of the Directive on copyright and related rights in the Digital Single Market. In spring 2026, the European Parliament is also expected to vote on an own-initiative report (rapporteur: Axel Voss, EPP, Germany) regarding copyright and generative artificial intelligence. 

It is important to note that the Danish rules would only apply to illegal content on its territory through geo-blocking by very large online platforms and very large search engines. If other Member States or the EU do not adopt similar rules, it would still be possible for deepfakes imitating personal characteristics of people to be available outside Denmark.

Overall, the initiative may demonstrate the need to create a new EU-wide category of illegal content. There could also be possibilities to strengthen enforcement of existing national and EU rules, along with improving technical capabilities to detect AI-generated content. Whether the approach of acting in the copyright sphere will be adopted by other Member States or at EU level remains to be seen. In any case, there is momentum to continue work in this field.