WHEATON, Ill. (WLS) — One local artist was shocked when he saw what looked like one of his drawings circulating online.

The caricature even had Jason Seiler’s signature, but it was not his work. Now, the I-Team is finding out what his legal rights are to protect his livelihood and income.

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“I’ve been doing it all my life since I was a little kid,” Seiler said.

The Wheaton illustrator has spent his life creating caricatures for magazines, books, films, and clients worldwide.

“I draw and I paint seven days a week, basically,” Seiler said.

But with AI, he says, his unique work he has spent years perfecting can now be faked in minutes.

“It was something that would take me a week to do that I’ve literally put everything into my entire life to be able to do to feed my family, and they can do it in two minutes. It’s ridiculous. It’s ridiculous. It’s scary. It’s messed up,” Seiler said.

Seiler says a fan online sent the picture in question to him and told him it was created, using an AI app. It is not Seiler’s work, but AI created it using his artistic style and even added his signature.

“So, not only is it studying my artwork and trying to create artwork based off my work, but then it signs it with ‘Jason Seiler,'” Seiler said. “I want to pull the hair out of my head. I think it’s insulting it. You know, it takes away from, you know, all the years that I’ve worked towards becoming the artist that I am. And it’s my livelihood; it’s how I make a living.”

So, what can he do? And do he and other creators have any legal power to fight back? ABC7 I-Team Consumer Investigator Jason Knowles went looking for answers.

Intellectual property expert Joshua Sarnoff of the DePaul University College of Law says in order to sue an individual, the artist would need to know who entered the information into AI, and it would be even harder to sue the company behind the AI tool, because the reproduction can be considered fair use.

“Who are you going to sue? First, do you know what the AI is that helped a person to generate it? Second, do you know who the person is, who did generate it? Because if you don’t have someone to sue, you don’t really have right to enforce,” Sarnoff said. “It makes people who are not experts able to generate content who never could. That’s a wonderful thing. We like greater creativity. At the same time, it also makes them much more easily able to copy the styles or perhaps, actually, just copy the exact works made by other people.”

Sarnoff says Seiler’s case highlights new challenges for copyright law.

“It is his style. And again, the question is, is a style itself copyrightable? And the answer is maybe, maybe not. It’s a tough question. And it always goes back to, what was the work that this is claimed to be substantially similar to? He has not done a character of this person,” Sarnoff said.

Sarnoff says the public may get more answers once we learn the final outcome of two big AI cases in California. Both cases were filed against artificial intelligence companies and involve authors alleging AI copied their work. So far, these courts have cited fair use in favor of the AI companies, but the decisions are expected to be appealed to higher courts.

“So, if an artist can prove that down the line, right, this AI took my job. I’m no longer worth what I used to be. Would they have a case against the AI companies?” Knowles asked.

Sarnoff responded, “I don’t think so. But that’s precisely what these cases are trying to figure out.”

Seiler said, “A lot of jobs have been replaced. And it’s scary for me because it’s literally my livelihood. It’s what I depend on. That’s what I’ve worked my entire life, to be a professional illustrator.”

The Trump administration has said that overly restrictive regulations can stifle AI innovation and development.

So, on one hand there is the risk of people losing work from AI. On the other hand, the use of AI can help lead to the creation of more content and more ideas.