Amid rise of AI
deepfakes, Spotify to let artists vet releases before they appear on their profiles
Spotify is giving artists a new way to protect their profiles from AI deepfakes and misattribution.
The streaming platform is piloting a new opt-in feature that lets artists review and approve eligible releases before they go live.
The company says protecting artist identity has become “a top priority for 2026,” noting that “the rise of easy-to-produce AI tracks has made the [misattribution] problem worse” across streaming services.
Spotify’s new Artist Profile Protection feature — now in limited beta — has been designed to combat ongoing issues with misattributed releases, whether from metadata errors, artists sharing the same name, or “bad actors” who are “maliciously” attaching music to artists’ profiles.
“Open-access distribution channels have lowered the barrier for independent artists to share music with the world, promote collaborations easily, and transfer music between distributors seamlessly,” says Spotify. “But that openness comes with gaps that bad actors can exploit.”
Supreme Court Unanimously Sides With Cox Communications In $1 Billion Major Label Copyright Battle — With Major Implications for Other ISP Battles
In a judgment that will dramatically affect the copyright litigation landscape, the Supreme Court has unanimously held that ISPs, in providing internet access without actively encouraging piracy, aren’t contributorily liable for users’ infringement.
The nation’s highest court handed down the significant decision today, the better part of a decade after a jury ordered Cox Communications to pay $1 billion. Stemming from an infringement complaint levied by the major record labels, the massive verdict specifically concerned the ISP’s alleged failure to address subscribers’ repeat infringement.
Unsurprisingly, the penalty didn’t sit right with Cox, which spearheaded a multi-year appeal. And on the opposite side of the dispute, the majors moved forward with several distinct-but-similar complaints against different ISPs; multiple actions were paused pending the Supreme Court’s decision here.
Streaming fraud man who pocketed $8m using hundreds of thousands of AI songs streamed billions of times by bots pleads guilty
The man at the center of what’s been described as the first-ever criminal prosecution for AI-assisted streaming fraud in the United States has pleaded guilty.
Michael Smith, of Cornelius, North Carolina, pleaded guilty today (March 19) to one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud before U.S. District Judge John G. Koeltl in the Southern District of New York.
The charge carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison. Smith has also agreed to pay over $8 million in forfeiture.
Smith is scheduled to be sentenced by Judge Koeltl on July 29.
Why Is the Music Industry Still Estimating Public Performance Plays? New Research Explores the Hidden Resistance to Better Tracking
It’s a relatively amazing feat of humankind: whenever a song is played in public, it’s typically tracked and paid for, with billions of dollars reaching their proper IP owners worldwide. That is, in theory at least.
At a top level, public performances of musical works – at sporting events, coffeehouses, restaurants, airports, wherever – are tracked by a vast and complex system of loosely tied organizations. Issues aside — and there are many — it’s a remarkably complex royalty-collection mechanism for music IP owners, with PROs (performance rights organizations) worldwide tracking and charging for music the public enjoys.
But is it time for that mechanism to undergo a system upgrade? That’s now a growing sentiment in the music industry, particularly among rights owners who feel that public performances aren’t being properly counted.
A system of estimated plays and proxies currently dominates the performance-tracking landscape, even while formats like streaming, downloads, videos, and even broadcast radio and vinyl are counted with relative precision. For more on this click here.
American Law Institute’s ‘Copyright Restatement’ Project Faces Growing Opposition—500+ Sign Petition Staunchly Opposing New Rules
A petition to bring awareness to the inaccuracies of copyright law in the American Law Institute’s Copyright Restatement has over 500 signatures.
In opposition to the American Law Institute’s (ALI) Copyright Restatement and to highlight its “significant inaccuracies, omissions, and mischaracterizations of copyright law,” the Copyright Restatement Transparency Project (CRTP) has announced that its petition to raise awareness has surpassed 500 signatures.
The CRTP was formed by members of the copyright and creative communities, including individuals and organizations that participated in the Copyright Restatement for years but ultimately resigned from the project in its final stages. Those who resigned reportedly did so “when it became clear that the ALI would not address repeated concerns from the participants, professional organizations, prominent law professors and copyright experts, the U.S. Copyright Office, and Congress.”
US Recorded Music Revenue Hit $11.54 Billion in 2025 — As Paid Streaming, Vinyl Growth Offset an Ad-Supported Slip, RIAA Data Shows
Thanks in large part to 7% paid streaming growth, the US music industry generated all-time-high recorded revenue of $11.54 billion during 2025. However, both ad-supported and paid non-Premium streaming slipped.
These and other stats come from the RIAA’s newly released 2025 year-end report, which, like the H1 ’25 breakdown, calculated for wholesale revenue as opposed to estimated retail value.
At the top level, the pivot means reported figures are smaller than in years past; 2023’s headline revenue was $17.12 billion, for instance. But the trade organization also rolled out an interactive database compiling historical wholesale data and the all-important inflation-adjusted sums; technically, revenue has yet to top its late-90s peak in terms of actual value. Against the backdrop of steady streaming gains, permanent downloads’ long-running revenue contraction continued in 2025. But things were more positive for vinyl, which seemingly put its plateau concerns in the rearview by moving 46.8 million units (up 7.9% YoY) and generating $1.04 billion (up 9.3% YoY), per the report.
US wholesale recorded music revenue reached $11.5B in 2025, as paid streaming subscriptions hit 106.5M — adding 6.5M accounts YoY
That’s according to the RIAA’s new year-end report, published
March 16. (This is the RIAA’s first full-year report issued exclusively on a wholesale basis, following its shift to the new methodology in its H1 2025 midyear report. The change aligns the RIAA’s reporting with international standards like IFPI‘s Global Music Report, which is expected to be published later this week. The 2024 full-year figures have been restated on a wholesale basis for comparison. The RIAA has also launched an updated interactive database with historic revenue figures converted to wholesale).
That 3.1% growth rate narrowly outpaced US inflation, which sat at 2.7% across the 12 months of 2025. That’s an improvement on 2024, when MBW reported that the US market’s wholesale revenue growth of 2.7% actually trailed the rate of inflation.
The US recorded music industry’s total wholesale revenue of $11.535 billion in 2025 was up by +$347 million vs. the equivalent wholesale figure from 2024 ($11.188 billion).
Rumblings of an iPod Resurgence—Young Music Listeners Look to Distance Themselves From Streaming
A growing number of people, especially Gen Z, are looking to move away from streaming services, and Apple’s old iPod devices are having a resurgence.
People are buying up Apple’s retired tech like it’s going out of style—again—as an increasing number of music listeners long for a break from streaming services and smartphones. Especially among younger generations, the growing interest in classic iPods is part of a broader digital burnout trend spurring a return to offline devices and hobbies.
Apple discontinued the iPod product line in 2022, but Google Trends data reveals that searches for the original iPod and iPod Nano spiked last year: eBay searches for classic iPods jumped by 25% and iPod Nano by 20% between January and October 2025, compared to the same period in 2024. “The act of playing my music, with the sole purpose of listening to music—no ads, no apps, no distractions—makes my brain feel brand-new again,” said Shaughnessy Barker, a Gen Z-er who started using an iPod Classic over the winter holiday season after searching eBay and Facebook Marketplace.
Sony Music Says It Just Removed 135,000+ Deepfakes of Its Artists’ Music
Sony Music says it has requested the removal of more than 135,000 songs created by fraudsters impersonating its artists on streaming services. AI deepfakes of Beyoncé, Queen, and Harry Styles are among those removed.
Digital Music News has been reporting on the existence of AI deepfakes proliferating on digital streaming providers like Spotify, which does not require an AI label for its music.
Last year, country singer Blaze Foley was the target of deepfakes that saw songs added to his official Spotify Page, despite the artist being dead with no new music in the pipeline from his estate. Tyler, the Creator got a taste of launch deepfakery with the release of his Don’t Tap the Glass album release, which saw several AI tracks released with similar names dampening the album launch on Spotify.“The problem with deepfakes is that they are a demand-driven event,” Kooker continues. “They are taking advantage of the fact that an artist is out there promoting their music. That is when deepfakes are at their worst—building off of and benefitting from the demand and artist has created. Ultimately, it distracts from what the artist is trying to accomplish.”
The MLC and Pandora clash in opposition briefs as mechanical royalties battle nears decisive stage
The Mechanical Licensing Collective (MLC) and Pandora Media have each filed opposition briefs in their legal battle over whether the streaming service has underpaid royalties owed to rights holders.
Both filings landed on March 5 in the US District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee, one month after each party filed competing motions for summary judgment in the two-year-old lawsuit. The case centers on whether Pandora’s ad-supported radio service, Pandora Free, qualifies as an “interactive service” under the Copyright Act — and is therefore subject to mechanical royalty obligations for the entirety of its streams.
The MLC, established by the Music Modernization Act of 2018, serves as the sole entity authorized to collect and distribute “mechanical royalties” due for the reproduction and distribution of musical works. The collective argues that three features available on Pandora Free — personalized music programs, the ability to skip and replay songs, and on-demand track selection — each independently qualify it as an “interactive service” under the Copyright Act.
“Pandora does not just give users access to all three features, Pandora advertises that it gives users access to all three features,” the MLC said.
