Robin Williams' daughter issues heartbreaking plea over shocking AI videos

When someone you love passes away, the memory they leave behind becomes sacred.

Now imagine strangers using artificial intelligence to make your deceased father 'speak' words he never said and perform in ways he never agreed to.

For Zelda Williams, daughter of comedian Robin Williams, this disturbing scenario became a painful reality.

Zelda took to Instagram on 8 October to voice her distress over AI-generated videos of her late father.

'Please, just stop sending me AI videos of Dad. Stop believing I wanna see it or that I'll understand, I don't and I won't,' she wrote.

The post resonated with fans of Mrs Doubtfire, Good Will Hunting, and Dead Poets Society, but for Zelda, these recreations were more than digital novelty—they were deeply upsetting.

'To watch the legacies of real people be condensed down to 'this vaguely looks and sounds like them so that's enough', just so other people can churn out horrible TikTok slop puppeteering them is maddening,' Zelda continued.

She criticised the technology sharply, calling it 'the Human Centipede of content' and likening it to 'badly recycling and regurgitating the past to be re-consumed'.

AI deepfakes work by analysing thousands of images and video clips of a person to recreate their voice, facial movements, and mannerisms.

The recent surge in Robin Williams deepfakes followed the release of OpenAI's text-to-video model, Sora 2, which promises more realistic results but has drawn criticism for bypassing consent.

Below is an example of an AI-generated video of Robin Williams.

Free-to-use generative AI apps have made creating such videos accessible to anyone, raising ethical concerns about consent and exploitation.

Zelda has faced online cruelty before—shortly after her father’s death by suicide in August 2014, she quit Twitter due to trolling and manipulated images of Robin Williams.

During the 2023 Hollywood actors’ strike, she warned, 'I've witnessed for YEARS how many people want to train these models to create/recreate actors who cannot consent, like Dad. This isn't theoretical, it is very very real.'

Hollywood has also confronted the rise of AI performers

Last month, an AI character called Tilly Norwood debuted at the Zurich Film Festival as Hollywood’s first 'AI actor', created by Eline Van der Velden and intended for a talent agency contract.

The Screen Actors Guild-AFTRA condemned the development: 'To be clear, 'Tilly Norwood' is not an actor, it's a character generated by a computer program that was trained on the work of countless professional performers—without permission or compensation.'

Stars including Emily Blunt and Whoopi Goldberg supported the union, with Blunt saying on a podcast, 'Please stop taking away our human connection.'

For families like the Williams, AI deepfakes reduce beloved individuals to digital puppets, erasing the humanity behind their work.

'I've already heard AI used to get his 'voice' to say whatever people want and while I find it personally disturbing, the ramifications go far beyond my own feelings. Living actors deserve a chance to create characters with their choices, to voice cartoons, to put their HUMAN effort and time into the pursuit of performance,' Zelda wrote.

Signs that a video might be AI-generated include unnatural facial movements, slightly robotic voices, content that is out of character, accounts known for AI videos, and recent 'interviews' from people who have passed away.

The safest response is to avoid sharing, commenting on, or forwarding such content—especially to grieving families.

Zelda’s plea is simple: treat others with the respect you would want for your own loved ones.

'If you've got any decency, just stop doing this to him and to me, to everyone even, full stop. It's dumb, it's a waste of time and energy, and believe me, it's NOT what he'd want.'

As technology advances, the question is not whether we can recreate the dead—but whether we should.

The rise of AI deepfakes isn’t limited to celebrities—it can also affect ordinary people in deeply personal ways.

From manipulated videos to fake images, technology is increasingly being used without consent, raising serious ethical and legal questions.

For a closer look at how governments are responding to AI-generated content and protecting individuals, check out this related story.

Read more: Worried about AI creating fake nudes of real people? The government is finally taking action

Have you ever encountered AI videos of someone who has passed away, and how did it make you feel?