First Prison Sentence for AI Music Fraud
US man jailed for using bots to stream AI songs and steal royalties in first-ever case of its kind.
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Michael Smith, a North Carolina resident, was sentenced to 18 months in prison and fined $8 million for using automated bots to stream his own AI-generated songs and defraud royalty payments.
This marks the first-ever criminal case involving AI-assisted music streaming fraud. Between 2017 and 2024, Smith created hundreds of thousands of AI tracks and operated up to 10,000 bots on platforms like Spotify and YouTube Music. The DOJ noted that in April 2023 alone, his bot accounts generated 80.9 million streams on YouTube Music, nearly nine times the volume of Taylor Swift's entire catalog during the same period.
The ruling establishes criminal liability for combining AI-generated content with automation for financial gain, serving as a warning to streaming platforms regarding anti-fraud measures and AI content compliance.