22/12/2025

LYFE MONDAY | DEC 22, 2025

24

Music streaming fraudulence o Artistes caution listeners of AI impersonators

D OES the latest track by your favourite singer sound slightly off? You may be right. Fraudulent artificial intelligence (AI)-generated tracks are increasingly appearing in artistes’ own profiles on streaming platforms, presented as their original work. British folk musician Emily Portman got a shock in July when she received a message from a fan congratulating her on her new album – even though she had not released one since 2022. That is when she discovered Orca on numerous streaming platforms, including Spotify and Apple Music. The titles of the songs resembled something she might have created herself, but “very quickly I recognised that I was listening to AI-produced music,” she said. According to the independent artiste, the AI behind Orca was “trained” on her previous albums, mimicking her folk-inspired instrumentation and lyrics. “I just felt really uncomfortable and disturbed that people could be going to my profile, to find themselves tthinking ‘wow, what’s this?,’” she said. Portman said people were fooled despite the “pristine perfection” of the vocals and “vacuous lyrics”. The musician could not identify the perpetrators of the fraud, but believes she knows how they operate. “Scammers claiming to be artistes approach distribution companies, which then upload the music online without any identity checks,” she said. ‘Easiest scam in the world’ On the other side of the world, member of The Sweet Enoughs, Paul Bender also discovered from early this year that four “bizarrely bad” AI generated songs had been added to his band’s profiles. He said the streaming industry had not kept pace with security measures, such as two-factor authentication, now widely used in other sectors. “You just say: ‘Yes that’s me’ and upload a song to whoever’s profile. It’s the easiest scam in

also led to a rise in fraudulent activity despite garnering one million subscribers on Spotify. “The reason that music was uploaded under Portman’s name was essentially to make sure that they could gain royalties from it,” said Dougie Brown of the industry representative UK Music. Revenues on the platforms are generally low, but add up thanks to bots that multiply listening streams tenfold he said. Portman and Bender, who have not taken legal action asked the various platforms to remove the offending tracks – a process that took between 24 hours and eight weeks. Some countries and states have legislation to protect artistes against imitation, particularly in California. In others, including the UK, limited copyright leaves artistes vulnerable, said Philip Morris of Musicians’ Union. He said Portman’s case showed how AI generated music was now so advanced it could actually be used “to impersonate the original work of a real artiste”. Accused of a lack of transparency, Spotify recently announced measures to make the platform more reliable and transparent. Spotify says it is working upstream with distributors to better detect fraud, like its competitor Apple Music. “Across the music industry, AI is accelerating existing problems like fraud, deceptive content and spam,” it said. Despite her concerns about potential UK legislation that artistes say will damage their interests and fraudsters making a mockery of the beauty of the creative process, Portman is working on a new album. “The album that I’m making is costing a lot of money but for me it’s all about those human connections, creativity and teaming up with other amazing creatives,” she said. – AFP

Portman shares a screenshot of a counterfeit album falsely claiming to be created by her.

and singer Willow Smith, urging platforms to step up digital safety. Virtually undetectable Almost all listeners are now unable to distinguish AI-generated tracks from the real thing as AI-powered music generators, such as Suno and Udio, have become increasingly refined, according to an Ipsos study conducted in November on the French platform Deezer. This has driven success for bands created solely by AI, such as The Velvet Sundown, but

the world,” he said. After an Instagram discussion, Bender, who is also the bassist for the Grammy-nominated band Hiatus Kaiyote, received hundreds of messages from music fans and artistes. He compiled a list of numerous suspect albums – particularly in the catalogues of deceased artistes – such as the experimental Scottish musician Sophie, who died in 2021. Around 24,000 people signed a petition Bender launched on change.org, including rapper and singer-songwriter Anderson Paak

Folk singer Portman poses for a photo in Sheffield while talking about digital safety. – ALL PICS FROM AFP