The music industry has been fretting about fraudulent streams for several years now. Our first mention of ‘fake streams’ came in July 2017, and a couple of years later we reported on the launch of an ‘Anti-Stream Manipulation Code of Conduct’ signed by labels, publishers and DSPs.Since then, the grumbling about how bad actors are trying (and more importantly, succeeding) in gaming the streaming system and siphoning royalties away from artists and rightsholders has slowly but surely grown in volume.
https://musically.com/2023/01/19/just-how-big-is-the-music-industrys-fake-streams-problem/