Deezer starts labeling AI-generated music to tackle streaming fraud

Deezer announced on Friday that it will start labeling albums that include AI-generated tracks as part of its efforts to combat streaming fraud.

The company reports that about 18% of the music uploaded each day — more than 20,000 tracks — is now fully AI-generated. Although most of these tracks don’t go viral, Deezer says around 70% of their streams are fake and that they are designed to earn royalties fraudulently.

To combat this, AI-generated tracks on Deezer are now clearly tagged. These tracks also won’t appear in editorial playlists or algorithm-based recommendations, and fraudulent streams are being filtered out of royalty payments.

The company says the new labels will be a game changer in helping listeners determine the difference between human-created music and AI content.

Deezer notes that for now, AI-only songs make up just 0.5% of all streams on its platform, but that the trend is growing fast.

“We’ve detected a significant uptick in delivery of AI-generated music only in the past few months and we see no sign of it slowing down. It’s an industry-wide issue, and we are committed to leading the way in increasing transparency by helping music fans identify which albums include AI music,” said Deezer CEO Alexis Lanternier in a press release.

“AI is not inherently good or bad, but we believe a responsible and transparent approach is key to building trust with our users and the music industry,” he continued. “We are also clear in our commitment to safeguarding the rights of artists and songwriters at a time where copyright law is being put into question in favor of training AI models.”

Deezer applied for two patents in December 2024 for its AI Detection technology, which it says is focuses on two different ways of detecting “unique signatures” that are used to tell the difference between synthetic content and authentic content. 

The move comes as Universal Music Group, Warner Music Group, and Sony Music Entertainment are reportedly in talks to license their work to AI startups Udio and Suno. The startups are being sued by the record companies for copyright infringement, and any deal would help to settle lawsuits between them, Bloomberg reported earlier this month.