Fake Streams, Real Penalties: How One Artist Can Cost Your Whole Label

If you run a label, one artist's fake streams land on your account. Spotify charges the label or distributor that delivered the track, and distributors pass the fee on to the account the track came from. On a label account, that's you.

So in October 2026 we went through Spotify's artificial streaming policy, what distributors say about the fee, and the flags in AIR Music's own catalog. Spotify doesn't publish the amount. Distributors put it at €10 per flagged track, and a flag isn't always right: 4 of the 6 tracks flagged in our catalog in 2026 had real streams.

Here's what a label needs: how a flag on one track reaches your account, when a whole catalog comes down, where fake streams on a roster come from, what to do in the first 48 hours after a notice, what to put in artist contracts, and how to protect the roster before it happens.

How a Spotify Artificial Streaming Flag Reaches Your Label

Spotify sends the flag and the fee to the label or distributor that delivered the track. On a label account, the chain looks like this:

1. An artist, or a promo service they paid, drives bot plays to a track.
2. Spotify detects the streams and removes them from royalties, stream counts, and charts.
3. If the rate of artificial streams on the track is very high, Spotify charges a fee per track. The policy took effect on April 1, 2024.
4. The distributor passes the fee to the account the track came from. It can also warn you, suspend the account, or take the music down.
5. The fee and any action land on the label, whichever artist caused them.

Here's what happens at each level, as of October 2026.

What Spotify's artificial streaming policy does to a stream, a track, and a label account. From Spotify for Artists and distributor help pages, checked in October 2026.

Spotify charges the account that delivered the track, so on a label account one artist's bot plays cost the whole label. A per-track fee is the smaller risk, though. The next section covers the larger one: a whole catalog coming down.

When a Whole Catalog Comes Down for Someone Else's Fake Streams

Spotify says the fee is there to stop labels and distributors from delivering music for known bad actors, according to its artificial streaming policy. Distributors pay that fee, so they move fast. Audora's guide to distributor takedowns says distributors often take tracks down or close whole accounts automatically, before a person looks at them, and when an account is closed, "entire catalogs come down at once."

That can hit a label from two sides:

• From your roster. One artist's flagged tracks can get your label account suspended at the distributor, and every artist on it goes offline. TuneCore says it can shut an account down completely, depending on how much artificial streaming it finds across it.
• From your distributor. Platforms also go after distributors whose catalogs keep getting flagged. Spotify says its fee is meant to stop distributors from delivering music for known bad actors, and Apple Music has penalized labels and distributors with high levels of stream manipulation since 2022, Billboard reported. A distributor under that pressure acts fast, and its sweeps can reach labels that did nothing wrong.

At AIR Music, we've been on the distributor's side of the first one. When a platform blocked four tracks from one partner in our catalog over artificial streams, we took that partner's whole catalog down ourselves and ended the contract.

A label can lose its releases over fake streams it never bought, if those streams sit in the same distributor catalog. That makes your distributor's catalog part of your risk too. The last section covers how to check a distributor before you sign. First, where fake streams on a roster come from.

Where Fake Streams on a Label's Roster Come From

Spotify's guidance describes four ways artificial streams reach a track. Here they are, with what a label can check for each, as of October 2026.

Where artificial streams on a label's catalog come from, and what a label can check. From Spotify for Artists guidance, checked in October 2026.

An artist doesn't have to buy fake streams on purpose for a flag to land on your label: a paid promo service, a bot playlist, or a fan campaign is enough. The next section covers what to do when a notice arrives anyway.

What to Do in the First 48 Hours After an Artificial Streaming Notice

On a label account, the notice comes from your distributor. Spotify says the distributor can also issue a warning, charge the fee, suspend the account, or remove the music. 

Some distributors expect the label to investigate first: FUGA asks its clients to review the playlists that played the flagged tracks and any marketing campaigns behind them, and to take a track down if the review confirms the streams were artificial.

Here's what to do in the first two days:

1. Save the notice and list what it covers. Keep the email or dashboard message, and write down every flagged track with its ISRC, the release, and the dates in the notice.
2. Ask the artist how the release was promoted. Get the name of every promo service, playlist pitching service, or ad campaign they paid for, with dates and invoices.
3. Check the playlists the track was on. In Spotify for Artists, look at the playlists that sent streams during the flagged period, and report any you don't recognize with the Playlist Reporter.
4. Send it all to the distributor in one ticket. If the streams came from real promotion, Spotify tells artists to share how the music was promoted with their label or distributor, which then works with Spotify on a review. If the ticket sits unanswered, our guide on what a label can do when its distributor stops responding covers how to escalate it.
5. Hold off on re-uploading or switching distributors. A second delivery of the same release is one of the causes of duplicate artist profiles, SoundCloud says, and you'd have two versions to sort out. Our guide to fixing a wrong artist profile covers what to do if that's already happened. Wait for the distributor's answer first. Some distributors don't allow a re-upload at all after an artificial streaming removal. If you do switch later, move the catalog in an order that keeps its streams.
6. Tell the artist what happens next. Say what was flagged, what you've sent the distributor, and when you'll write again.

Spotify reviews a flag through the distributor, so the promo history and playlist reports a label sends in the first two days are its case for that review. Collecting them is easier when the artist contract already asks for them. That's the next section.

What to Put in Artist Contracts About Artificial Streaming

Spotify's fee lands on the label first. The artist contract decides whether it stays there. These are the clauses to go through with your music lawyer:

Contract clauses that cover artificial streaming between a label and its artists. A checklist to review with a lawyer, not legal advice.

Keep the recoupment clause to fees the artist's own promotion caused. A track can also end up on a bot playlist nobody on your side asked for, and Spotify says that happens.

Then read your own agreement with the distributor. Chase Lawyers, a music law firm, notes that many distributors can take content down for suspected artificial streaming, and some agreements allow it at the distributor's sole discretion, with little or no notice. Before you sign or renew, check:

• Whether the distributor warns you before a takedown, and how far ahead.
• Whether a takedown can cover your whole label account or only the flagged tracks.
• How the distributor passes on Spotify's fee, and whether it adds a charge of its own.
• How you appeal a flag, and who handles the appeal.

Talk to a music lawyer before you change either contract. Contracts cover what happens after a flag. The last section is about keeping flags off the roster in the first place.

How to Protect Your Roster Before a Flag Lands

Spotify charges labels and distributors so they screen who they deliver music for, its policy says. A label can do the same screening one level down:

• Check a new artist's numbers before you sign. Ask to see their Spotify for Artists data, and look for the two signs Spotify lists: a sudden spike in streams with no clear reason, followed by a drop, and a spike from a location where the artist's music hasn't been active before.
• Look for the same two signs across your roster every month. Distributors act on monthly artificial streaming reports from Spotify, Spotify says, so a monthly check keeps you on the same schedule.
• Approve paid promo before an artist buys it. Spotify calls any service that promises streams, playlist spots, or a place in its algorithmic recommendations for money a scam. Keep a short list of promo services your label has checked.
• Choose a distributor that screens who it takes on. When a distributor's catalog gets flagged, every label in it is exposed. Ask a distributor how it reviews new accounts before you move your catalog there.

At AIR Music, the music distribution service of AIR Media-Tech, every application goes through moderation before an artist or label joins the catalog. The team checks ownership, quality, brand safety, and release readiness to protect the artists already in it. After a track goes live, the checks continue:

• The team watches each new track's streams in the weeks after release. A sharp rise is compared with listeners, followers, and saves, because a spike on its own isn't proof of fraud.
• If the numbers don't add up, the label's manager asks how the release was promoted and checks the playlists it landed on with tools built to spot bot activity.
• If a platform flags the track, the platform charges AIR Music, and under the AIR Music contract the fee passes to the partner whose track was flagged. Whether the track stays up is the platform's call.

In 2026, 6 tracks in the AIR Music catalog were flagged for artificial streaming. For 4 of them, the team showed the platform that the streams were real. The other 2 had been placed on bought playlists run by bots and were taken down, and the partner stayed with AIR Music.

Diana Martuk, Head of AIR Music, has this advice for labels: "Don't use unverified playlist curators, and don't buy placements from them. Work with marketing services you've checked. Fewer streams from real fans are worth more than millions of bot streams. The damage to your reputation stays, because a history of artificial streams follows you, so it isn't worth experimenting."

A label can't control a distributor's whole catalog, but it can choose a distributor that controls who gets in.