GLOSSARY
Voice Cloning
Creating a synthetic copy of a specific person's voice from recordings — seconds of audio now suffice, which is both a creative superpower and a fraud vector.
Voice cloning models learn the timbre, pacing and accent of a speaker from samples, then read any new text in that voice. Professional uses are thriving: audiobook narrators scaling to more languages, game studios giving NPCs infinite dialogue, patients keeping their voice after throat surgery, and creators fixing mistakes without re-recording.
The abuse is equally real — “grandparent scams” using cloned family voices have forced an industry response. Reputable platforms (ElevenLabs, PlayHT, Resemble) require voice-owner consent verification, watermark outputs, and gate high-risk voices behind verification. The ethics line is simple in principle: clone your own voice or voices you are licensed to use, and disclose synthetic speech where listeners could be deceived.