Report that Spotify is distributing 'AI-generated music disguised as artists' songs'



Spotify allows not only famous artists but also unknown individuals to upload and distribute music. However, this system has been exploited to distribute AI-generated music that looks like it was made by a famous artist, as reported by the news site The Verge.

Not even Spotify is safe from AI slop - The Verge

https://www.theverge.com/2024/11/14/24294995/spotify-ai-fake-albums-scam-distributors-metadata



Elizabeth Lopat of The Verge received a notification that a new album by rock band

HEALTH had been released, and when she looked at it, she noticed that the cover design was different from that of a new HEALTH album, and the music was completely different. Upon investigation, she found that the album was a fake.

For example, the artwork for HEALTH's sixth album, 'RAT WARS,' looks like this.



The live announcements also have the same feel.



However, the fake album had the band's name superimposed on a background like a photo, and was completely different from their previous image. The band was aware of the fake album's existence as of October 2024, and made a flowchart of 'What if that album led to HEALTH's music?' as a joke. Of the following posts, the two albums labeled 'health (2024)' are fake albums.



Additionally, an image was posted of a person checking out the produced album, reacting with, 'An album of ambient healing music? That cum metal band? That's weird! I'll have to ask Johnny Health!'



According to Lopat's research, fake albums were found in Norwegian singer Annie, punk band Swans, two-piece band Standards, and others, with metalcore bands being the most common targets. Bands with single-letter album names were also prominent. The fake albums ranged from those that were deleted after a few days to those that were not deleted despite the artists' requests.

As for why such fake albums are registered, Lopat pointed out that it has to do with Spotify's monetization system.

Spotify receives all the data, information, and licenses for songs from distributors, distributes them, and pays royalties to distributors according to the number of plays. For example, in the case of Standards mentioned above, the official distributor is Topshelf Records, and money is paid to Topshelf Records for each time a Standards song is played, and Topshelf Records passes the money to Standards.

However, the fake Standards album was provided by a distributor called 'Gupta Music,' and royalties for the plays were paid to Gupta Music. Lopat confirmed that Gupta Music has registered more than 700 albums with similar artwork.



In addition, there is a distributor of the same name called 'Gupta Music' that handles labels such as Disney and Republic Records. Spokesperson Carly Calioli explained to Lopat that 'we have no involvement whatsoever in the activity you have pointed out,' and that it is a different distributor with the same name but no connection to the company that is uploading the fake albums.

Ameritz Music, the distributor behind the fake album, did not respond to a request for comment.

One solution to this problem would be to ban the uploading and distribution of AI-generated music, but it is also true that there are people in the music scene who enjoy AI-generated music.

'AI music' made by AI is trending, and there is a popular server on Discord with over 20,000 people - GIGAZINE



In an interview with Lopat, Andrew Barty, CEO of Beatdapp , a streaming fraud detection service, pointed out that AI is simply accelerating the fraud that has always existed on Spotify.

Related Posts:

in Web Service, Posted by logc_nt