Streaming service Spotify said that in a high-profile U.S. streaming fraud case, only 0.6% of the funds allegedly scammed came from Spotify.
“Spotify invests heavily in automated and manual moderation to prevent, detect and mitigate the impact of human-streamed media on our platform,” a Spotify spokesperson said. MBW in an email.
“In this case, our precautionary measures appear to be effective and limit royalties [Michael] Smith is able to generate approx. $60,000 of USD 10,000,000 stated in the indictment. Since Spotify usually accounts for approx. 50% Stream sharing, which shows how effective we are at limiting the impact of human streaming on our platform.
as MBW The U.S. Department of Justice charged a North Carolina resident with Michael Smith Charged with three felonies involving “a scheme to use artificial intelligence to create hundreds of thousands of songs and to use automated programs called ‘bots’ to transmit the artificial intelligence-generated songs billions of times.”
The U.S. Attorney’s Office alleged that Smith “fraudulently obtained more than US$10 million Royalties are paid through his plan between 2017 and 2024.
Smith faces charges of wire fraud, conspiracy to commit wire fraud and conspiracy to commit money laundering, each of which carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison.
The indictment against Smith unsealed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York describes an unnamed streaming service that was able to detect Smith’s activity as streaming fraud and cut off his payments as early as 2019.
At least one news source has identified the streaming service (referred to in the indictment as “Streaming Platform-1”) as Spotify, based on the wording of the terms of service cited in the indictment.
“In or about March 2019, the streaming platform – I notified a music distribution company (“Distribution Company-3″) working with Defendant Michael Smith that the streaming platform – I believed Smith had engaged in streaming fraud,” the indictment states.
“Shortly thereafter, [Smith] Communicate directly with the streaming media platform-I, deny that it engages in live broadcast fraud, and require the streaming platform-I to restore its music.
As streaming fraud becomes a growing problem in the music industry, Spotify is showing signs that it is taking the issue seriously and has developed tools to detect it.
Last May, Spotify blocked certain tracks produced using its artificial intelligence music generation platform bumiafter detecting “artificial streaming” of tracks created by Boomy.
(At last count, Boomy said it has been used to create more than 20 million song.
Also last year, Spotify began making changes to its royalty payment model, including a policy of financially penalizing music publishers (including record labels) when streaming fraud is detected in tracks they upload.
“Spotify invests heavily in automated and manual moderation to prevent, detect and mitigate the impact of human streamers on our platform.”
Spotify
Spotify also partners with other streamers Amazon Music and sound cloudas well as music companies such as believe, empire, Release boy and United Masters form Music fights fraudan “unprecedented alliance… aimed at eliminating streaming fraud.”
according to beat appStreaming scams are everywhere, a music data company calls itself ‘the leading authority in fraud detection’ US$2 billion Deducted annually from the artist’s royalties.
While the U.S. Attorney’s Office described Smith’s case as “the first criminal case involving artificially inflated music streaming,” it is not the first such case outside the United States.
Earlier this year, a 53-year-old man in Denmark was sentenced to 18 months in prison after a court found that he had artificially inflated the streaming numbers of 689 songs he uploaded to streaming services such as Spotify. apple music and you watch music.
Prosecutors initially claimed the defendants obtained 4.38 million Danish kroner ($635,000) about the fraud flow, but in the end it can only prove 2 million Danish kroner ($290,000) income.
this danish rights union Called the verdict “historic” and said it sent a “strong message about the seriousness of the stream manipulation challenge”.global music business