Tennessee ELVIS Act

The pain the Tennessee ELVIS Act is causing our customers

The Tennessee ELVIS Act was passed in response to a wave of AI-generated music and video content that imitated Nashville artists without permission. Voice cloning had gone from research demo to consumer product in eighteen months, and country music was one of the first industries hit. The law now applies to any use of AI to imitate voice or likeness, in any industry. Companies that use AI-generated voice, AI-generated images, or AI-generated video need to understand what the Tennessee ELVIS Act prohibits and how far its reach extends.

What the Tennessee ELVIS Act actually does

The Act amends Tennessee's existing right of publicity statute (the Personal Rights Protection Act) to explicitly include voice as a protected element. It makes it unlawful to knowingly use or make available any algorithm, software, tool, or other technology to produce a specific individual's photograph, voice, or likeness without authorization. It creates both civil and criminal remedies.

Voice is now on the same protected footing as image and likeness in Tennessee. AI-generated voice imitations, deepfake videos, and AI-generated images that look like or sound like a specific person now trigger the same protections that celebrity image rights have always had.

What the Tennessee ELVIS Act requires you to do

Get consent before using voice or likeness

Companies using AI to generate voice, image, or video simulations of real people need written consent. This is particularly relevant for advertising, entertainment, and content generation businesses.

Do not distribute unauthorized simulations

Distributing, publishing, or making available AI-generated content that imitates a real person without consent is prohibited even if you did not create it.

Vet training data and outputs

AI systems trained on voice, image, or video of specific people may produce outputs that fall within the Act's scope. Companies training or deploying such systems need documentation about training data sources and output constraints.

Cover both living persons and estates

The Act protects rights of publicity that extend beyond death for a period. Estates of deceased persons (including deceased Tennessee artists) can enforce these rights.

Why the Tennessee ELVIS Act matters to you

Even if you are not in entertainment or Nashville-based, the Tennessee ELVIS Act reaches any use of AI voice or likeness simulation that touches Tennessee residents. Every state legislature is watching Tennessee to see how the law performs. Similar laws are pending in California, New York, and other states. The Tennessee ELVIS Act is the template for the next generation of voice-and-likeness protection against AI.

Related: Tennessee SB 1580 (Mental Health AI Chatbot Ban)

Tennessee also enacted SB 1580, signed April 1, 2026 and effective July 1, 2026. It prohibits developers and deployers of AI systems from advertising or representing that an AI system is, or can act as, a qualified mental health professional. Violations constitute deceptive trade practices under the Tennessee Consumer Protection Act, with civil penalties up to $5,000 per violation. Passed 32-0 in the Senate and 94-0 in the House. Companies marketing AI-powered mental health tools in Tennessee, including digital health startups and telehealth platforms, need to review marketing language and product positioning against SB 1580 before continuing to operate in the state.

What the research says about Tennessee ELVIS Act

The academic literature on Tennessee ELVIS Act is ahead of most corporate practice, and it is unusually blunt. Two findings are worth putting in front of any executive who thinks this is a compliance formality.

“all those who are involved in the research, development and maintenance of AI systems have social and ethical responsibilities”

Camilleri, Expert Systems (2023)

That is the gap between having AI and governing it. The second finding is the one that tends to change the room.

“concerns about their impact on individual and societal wellbeing, particularly due to the lack of transparency and accountability”

Cheong, Frontiers in Human Dynamics (2024)

Neither of these is a fringe position. Both come from peer-reviewed work, and both describe the condition most organisations are actually in when the question about Tennessee ELVIS Act arrives from the board, the buyer, or the regulator.

How to get compliant with Tennessee ELVIS Act: a 5-step path

This is the sequence that works, and it is not the sequence most organisations choose. They start with the framework and work backwards toward reality. Start with reality.

1. Inventory the AI in scope. List every AI system that could fall under Tennessee ELVIS Act. Record what it does, what decision it influences, what data it touches, and who owns it. You cannot govern AI you cannot name, and almost every organisation we assess is running more AI than its leadership believes.
2. Determine whether you are actually in scope. Work out precisely which of your AI systems and activities Tennessee ELVIS Act reaches, and write the determination down with its reasoning. Do this in writing. A documented scope determination, right or wrong, is defensible. An undocumented assumption is not.
3. Assign one accountable owner. Name a person, not a committee, with the authority to stop a deployment. Governance without someone who can say no is documentation, not control.
4. Build the evidence file. Assemble the documentation Tennessee ELVIS Act expects: the scope, the risk assessment, the controls, the testing evidence, and the incident record. Assemble it before anyone asks. Reconstructing it under a regulator's deadline costs several times more and looks exactly like what it is.
5. Set a review cadence and hold it. Re-run the assessment on a schedule and after any material change to the model, the data, or the use case. Alignment decays. A control tested once is a snapshot, not a control.

Done in this order, Tennessee ELVIS Act becomes tractable. Done out of order, it becomes a document nobody uses and a control nobody exercises.

Frequently asked questions about the Tennessee ELVIS Act

Does the Tennessee ELVIS Act apply to non-celebrities?

Yes. The Act protects every individual's voice, image, and likeness, not just celebrities. This is a significant departure from traditional right-of-publicity law.

Does the Tennessee ELVIS Act apply to satire or parody?

The Act includes First Amendment considerations and does not eliminate fair use protections for legitimate news, commentary, satire, or parody. However, the scope of these exceptions is narrow and being tested.

Does the Tennessee ELVIS Act apply to companies outside Tennessee?

Yes, if the AI content is distributed to Tennessee residents or if the imitated person is a Tennessee resident.

Where does the Tennessee ELVIS Act fit in SRJ's work?

Voice-and-likeness compliance is covered in the AI Vendor Risk Inventory™ and content-authentication guidance in The Operating Discipline for AI Library™.

Primary sources on Tennessee ELVIS Act

The authoritative texts and agency pages behind this summary. We keep this page current, but where a compliance decision turns on exact wording, read the source. Anything concerning Tennessee ELVIS Act that carries legal consequence should be confirmed against the enrolled text or the issuing body, not against a secondary summary, including this one.

• Tennessee General Assembly