Equity has responded to a new agreement reached in the United States between SAG-AFTRA and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers by stating that it will “accept no less than the global industry standard on AI protections”.

The new 2026 TV/Theatrical Agreement was approved by SAG-AFTRA members on 4 June, and includes detailed provisions on artificial intelligence, including explicit protections for ‘no-scan’ digital replicas, requirements for consent before a digital replica can be used to dub a performance into another language, and obligations on producers to protect digital replicas from unauthorised access, use and copying.

Equity has previously called for greater protections relating to artificial intelligence as it negotiates a new Equity-PACT agreement. As we commented here, earlier this year, Equity members overwhelmingly indicated that they would be prepared to refuse to be digitally scanned on set to secure adequate AI protections, and Equity warned that “industrial action short of a strike” could be taken if an agreement were not reached on this matter.

Buoyed by the outcome in the United States, Equity’s general secretary, Paul W. Fleming, said that it has created “a clear global minimum standard for AI protections for performers, which covers key issues of scanning, consent, data security for digital replicas, remuneration and a commitment to favour human performances. This foundation must now be built on in our legislative and industrial context in what we hope are the closing weeks of our own negotiations”.

Fleming added, “now this floor has been established, PACT and the streamers need to propose a package which meets this, and sets out its application to our agreements. Critically, if standards in the USA are acceptable on AI, then we expect to see movement to implement equivalent royalties in the instances where our agreements do not have an equivalent or superior provision.”

Separately, Equity members working under the TAC/Equity Television Agreement have approved a new agreement for performers working on productions commissioned for S4C which Equity describes as “one of the first collective agreements of its kind in the UK to establish specific protections governing the use of artificial intelligence in television production”.

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