Leading voiceover artist ‘violated’ by ScotRail AI announcements using her voice without…

27 May 2025, 20:19

The voice of Estée Lauder, Apple and B&Q adverts told LBC she was not informed and did not give permission for Scotland’s nationalised rail company to use the AI version of her voice.

Last week, ScotRail announced that automated announcements would be made by an AI voice nicknamed ‘Iona’. That voice is based on Gayanne Potter’s work for ReadSpeaker in 2021.

The actress, who’s heard on stations including LBC, signed a contract to perform ‘limited’ voice work for the Swedish firm four years ago.

Ms Potter says the contract was under ‘standard terms’, meaning she signed over her rights to the recordings to ReadSpeaker. But the professional voice actor argues she could not consent to artificial intelligence use, as it didn’t exist in its current form at the time.

“I felt absolutely sick,” Gayanne told LBC. “I’ve been fighting this for two years – to have this version of my voice removed from the internet by a specific company that hold my voice data, and they are refusing. So to find out that ScotRail are using it for their new AI announcer was absolutely devastating.

“We need protection. The politicians need to stand up and make a point. We need legislation to protect us because – apart from my voice as a professional voiceover actress that’s being abused – as a human being, I feel violated.

“My right to know who has my biometric data has been abused. I should know where my voice is, who owns it and have the right to withdraw consent.”

Ms Potter told LBC her agent has communications from 2021 showing ReadSpeaker promised not to sell on her data to third parties. She understood the work would be used for ‘e-learning, or for visually impaired readers, where text needed spoken out and there couldn’t be a voiceover’.

Mathilde Pavis, who leads Ms Potter’s legal team, told LBC she tried to resolve the issue directly with Read Speaker, but that failed. Then in February 2025 they submitted a complaint to the Information Commissioner’s Office based on GDPR, arguing the use of Ms Potter’s voice to create an AI tool is a breach of personal data because Gayanne’s voice is identifiably hers.

However, the ICO said because ReadSpeaker is based in Sweden and didn’t have customers using the voice in the UK, the dispute wasn’t in its jurisdiction. That ruling came prior to ScotRail purchasing the use of the ‘Iona’ voice.

Ms Pavis is warning of the dangers if AI isn’t regulated.

“The technology could be used for deepfake porn,” she said. “In Gayanne’s case the contract does exclude use of the recordings in the context of pornography or X-rated content. However, because she’s a professional voice, it’s really important for her to have control and have a say over where her voice travels and what it is applied to, as well as being remunerated for that.”

The issue of AI being trained by intellectual property has been raised by musicians and music artists like Elton John.

“You can’t do good business in a space where you don’t have clear regulation,” Ms Pavis continued. “The broader issue on copyright and AI training is that AI needs to train on content to ‘learn’ a task.

“Many artists, rightly so, say that if your tool is going to compete with me by creating content that comes close to what I sell for a living, and if you’re going to use my previous work in order to create that technology, then we should sit down and talk about a revenue share.”

A ScotRail spokesperson said: “It would be a matter for Ms Potter to take up with ReadSpeaker. We have no plans to remove the voice from our trains.”

A ReadSpeaker spokesperson said: “ReadSpeaker is aware of Ms Potter’s concerns. ReadSpeaker and Ms Potter have a contract regarding the use of her voice. ReadSpeaker has comprehensively addressed Ms Potter’s concerns with her legal representative several times in the past.”