Rapper RBX has sued Spotify, claiming the Swedish audio company has failed to stop artificially inflating music streams for artists like Drake and harming the revenue other rights holders make through the platform.
RBX, whose real name is Eric Dwayne Collins, is seeking class action status and damages from Spotify. According to the lawsuit filed in US District Court in Los Angeles on Sunday, RBX, like other rights holders, receives payment based on how often their music is streamed on Spotify.
Spotify pays copyright holders a percentage of revenue based on the total number of streams attributed to them compared to the total streams of all songs, the suit says.
The Long Beach rapper said rights holders are losing money on Spotify because some artists' streams are artificially inflated by bots running automated software, even though the use of such bots is prohibited on the platform, according to the lawsuit.
For example, the lawsuit notes that during a four-day period in 2024, there were at least 250,000 plays of Drake's song “No Face,” which appears to have originated in Turkey but “was erroneously mapped as a result of the coordinated use of VPNs in the United Kingdom in an attempt to conceal their origin.”
Spotify knew or should have known “with reasonable diligence that fraudulent activity was occurring on its platform,” the lawsuit says, describing the streamer's fraud-eradication policies as “window dressing.”
Spotify declined to comment on the ongoing litigation, but said it “in no way benefits from the industry-wide artificial streaming problem.”
“We are investing heavily in continually improving, best-in-class systems to combat this and protect artist payments with strong protections such as removing fake streams, withholding royalties and collecting fines,” Spotify said in a statement.
Last year the American producer was accused of stealing $10 million from streaming services, and Spotify said it was able to limit theft on its platform to $60,000, touting it as proof that its systems work.
The platform is also making efforts to counter AI-generated music that is created without the artists' permission. In September, Spotify announced that remote over 75 million AI-generated “spammy” music tracks from its platform in the last 12 months.
A representative for Drake did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
RBX is known for his work on the album Dr. Dre's 1992 “The Chronic” and Snoop Dogg's 1993 album “Doggystyle”. He has several solo albums and has collaborated with artists including Eminem's The Marshall Mathers LP and Kris Kross' Da Bomb. RBX is Snoop Dogg's cousin.
Artificial intelligence continues to change the way the entertainment industry operates, affecting everything from film and television production to music. In the music industry companies sued Artificial intelligence startups have accused companies of using copyrighted music to train artificial intelligence models.
At the same time, some music artists have embraced artificial intelligence, using the technology to test bold ideas. music videos and in their songs.
