California advertisers can no longer pass off computer-generated actors as real people without saying so. Governor Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 1050 in Los Angeles this week, according to the governor's office, requiring explicit disclosure whenever a video or audio advertisement uses AI-generated performers to sell a product or service.
The bill, authored by Senator Angelique Ashby, a Sacramento Democrat, also prohibits the continued use of any advertisement found to violate the law — a provision that goes beyond one-time labeling and forces companies to pull non-compliant spots from circulation. For more context on this story, see our ongoing AI news.
What the law requires
Under SB 1050, any advertisement that features what the state calls a "synthetic performer" — an AI-created digital figure, voice, or representation realistic enough that viewers might mistake it for an actual person — must clearly disclose its artificial origin. The definition, laid out in the governor's press release, covers both visual likenesses and cloned voices.
"Californians deserve to know when the person selling them something isn't a person at all," Newsom said in a statement. "As AI transforms the entertainment industry, we're protecting workers while ensuring California's creative economy can continue to grow and thrive."
Senator Ashby framed the bill as a defense of the state's signature industry. "The bill requires that synthetic figures be labeled as such, thus protecting consumers from false advertising and disallowing AI to replace real people — real people who work every day to bring stories and brands to life," she said.
Hollywood's union backing
SAG-AFTRA, the union representing film and television performers, helped craft the bill's language. National Executive Director and Chief Negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland said the measure "gives consumers greater transparency by making clear when they are seeing synthetics rather than human performers," calling it an important step in protecting consumers from deceptive AI practices.
The union's involvement reflects the stakes for its members. Two years after the strikes that centered partly on AI protections, the rapid improvement of generative video and voice tools has renewed fears that digital replicas could undercut human performers entirely. Transparency requirements like California's are designed to keep synthetic performers from quietly displacing humans in commercial work, where much of the early displacement is occurring.
Part of a broader California AI buildout
SB 1050 extends a stack of AI laws Newsom has signed over successive sessions. Last year, the governor signed protections helping actors and performers control their digital likenesses in audio and visual productions, including rules governing the recreation of deceased performers' likenesses. In 2024, he signed the California AI Transparency Act, which requires AI watermarking and directs companies to provide detection tools and disclosures for AI-generated or altered content.
The pace has accelerated this month. Per the governor's office, just last week Newsom signed SB 813, making California the first state to require assessments by independent verification organizations that AI systems comply with state law, along with AB 1405, which mandates third-party audits of AI systems. He also signed bipartisan legislation imposing safeguards on companion chatbots, including a prohibition on addictive features for users under 16.
Those measures followed SB 53, the California Transparency in Frontier Artificial Intelligence Act signed in 2025, which requires frontier AI developers to publish their safety frameworks, report critical safety incidents to the state, and protects whistleblowers who raise serious risk concerns.
Why audio ads are in scope
The inclusion of audio advertisements is significant for an industry where voice cloning has moved fastest. Synthetic voices can now be produced cheaply enough that radio spots, podcast reads, and streaming audio ads are among the first commercial formats where listeners routinely cannot tell whether a human recorded the script. By covering "any video or audio advertisement," the law attaches the disclosure duty to the formats where AI substitution is least visible, not just the glossy video spots where a digital face might give the game away.
Enforcement mechanics also differ from earlier transparency laws. Because the bill prohibits the continued use of any advertisement found to violate it, a company cannot cure a violation by relabeling an old campaign prospectively — the offending ad has to come down. Consumer groups have argued that provision gives the law teeth that pure labeling rules lack, since the value of a deceptive ad lies in its repeated exposure.
A national template — with company
California is not acting alone. Transparency Coalition noted that the state joins New York in requiring disclosure of synthetic performers in advertising, and consumer groups have pointed to the two-state patchwork as the beginning of a de facto national standard, since national ad campaigns rarely produce state-specific variants.
For advertisers, the compliance picture has grown more complicated. Agencies producing campaigns for national distribution must now determine whether any synthetic voice, face, or figure in their creative triggers disclosure duties in California and New York — and ensure violating ads are actually withdrawn, not just relabeled, under the Golden State's continued-use ban.
The law takes effect as generative advertising tools move into the mainstream, and enforcement details will matter. But its core premise is now settled in the country's largest media market: when the spokesperson is synthetic, the audience gets to know.
---
Stay Ahead of AIGet the latest AI news, analysis, and breakthroughs — all in one place.
Read more AI news →
