Sony Music has requested that more than 135,000 deepfake songs featuring its artists be removed from streaming services. The fake songs are reportedly created with generative AI, with fraudsters posing as artists such as Beyoncé, Queen, and Harry Styles. According to reports, the spread of these forgeries causes significant commercial harm to legitimate artists and is particularly common around new album releases.
Sony reportedly states that the number of deepfake songs is increasing as AI becomes cheaper and more accessible, and the tracks discovered so far likely represent only a fraction of the total number uploaded to streaming services. Since March of last year, approximately 60,000 songs have been identified with artists including Bad Bunny, Miley Cyrus, and Mark Ronson.