Sony has sought 260,000+ AI deepfake takedowns; Italy probes Suno’s terms
Italy’s competition authority is examining Suno’s rules on account terminations and content licenses, while Sony’s AI takedown requests have nearly doubled since March.
If you make edits or original tracks with an AI generator, the fine print on that generator is now under investigation in Italy. The country’s competition authority, the AGCM, opened a probe into Suno’s terms of service on Tuesday, October 6, saying they “may be unfair pursuant to Article 33 of the Consumer Code” because they “may create a significant imbalance in the rights and obligations under the contract, to the detriment of consumers.” Its concerns, as laid out in MBW’s weekly round-up, are price changes, account terminations, US-based arbitration, and a content license that the AGCM says requires users to waive their moral rights.
Read those clauses before a track goes into a set or a release. Keep local copies of anything you make, since account termination is on the regulator’s list.
Suno, meanwhile, hired Ticketmaster’s Michael Chua as Vice President and General Manager of Suno Live Experiences, which includes the concert-discovery platform Songkick. Suno acquired Songkick from Warner Music Group in November 2025 as part of the licensing agreement that settled WMG’s copyright lawsuit against it.
By the end of September, Sony Music had asked platforms to remove more than 260,000 AI-generated tracks impersonating its artists, the Financial Times reported on Monday, October 5. At the end of March the figure was 135,000. That works out to over 20,000 requests a month in the second and third quarters. The artists named include Harry Styles, Adele and Michael Jackson. If a track sounds like a famous artist who never made it, leave it out of your crate.
On Wednesday, October 7, the US Copyright Office published a notice of inquiry on music streaming fraud, a day after Michael Smith, 54, of Cornelius, North Carolina, was sentenced to 18 months in prison for a scheme prosecutors say brought him more than $8 million in royalties. The Office wants to know how streaming fraud is carried out, what it costs, and how it relates to AI-generated music. Written comments are due November 23 and reply comments December 21. If you release music and have a view on bot streams or AI uploads, you can file one.
