Judge Dismisses $600M Bot-Streaming Lawsuit Against Spotify

A lawsuit alleging that Spotify failed to address bot-driven fraudulent streams involving artists such as Drake, potentially reducing royalties paid to other music rightsholders, has been permanently dismissed by a US federal judge.

The original claim:

• In November 2025, rapper RBX – real name Eric Dwayne Collins – filed a proposed class action seeking to represent US rightsholders whose music is on Spotify.

• Spotify pools subscription and advertising revenue in each market monthly, then distributes it according to each track’s share of streams.

• RBX argued that artificially inflating one artist’s streams reduces the proportion of royalties available to other rightsholders.

• Drake was cited as the central example but was not named as a defendant.

The rulings:

• On June 22, Judge Josephine Staton dismissed RBX’s original complaint, finding that he had not established Spotify owed artists a legal duty to protect them from third-party bots, or that the company had violated California’s Unfair Competition Law.

• RBX filed an amended complaint on July 13, alleging that a “substantial, non-trivial percentage” of Drake’s approximately 37 billion Spotify streams over a 48-month period were generated by bots.

• The amended complaint estimated that the alleged fraud had diverted at least $600 million in royalties from music rightsholders.

• It also argued that Spotify selectively enforced its anti-fraud policies, penalizing smaller artists while allowing alleged artificial streaming involving major artists to go unchecked.

• On October 23, Judge Staton dismissed the revised case with prejudice, finding that it still failed to establish a valid legal claim.

• She also found insufficient evidence that Spotify’s statements about its anti-fraud measures were deceptive.

• The judge ruled that allowing another amendment would be futile, preventing RBX from bringing the same claims again.

• The ruling did not determine whether Drake’s streams were fraudulent.

What’s next:

• RBX’s lawyer said an appeal was likely.