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Michael Smith was sentenced on October 6, 2026, to 18 months in prison for using automated accounts to stream songs he owned—generally AI-generated tracks—and fraudulently collect music royalties. The sentence also includes two years of supervised release and forfeiture of $8,091,843.64, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York.
What sentence did Michael Smith receive?
Smith received 18 months in federal prison, followed by two years of supervised release. The court also ordered him to forfeit $8,091,843.64. The outcome followed his March 19, 2026 guilty plea to one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud.
When Smith pleaded guilty, the Justice Department said the charge carried a maximum sentence of five years. That was the statutory maximum—not the sentence the court ultimately imposed.
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According to the Justice Department’s account of the case, the scheme ran from 2017 through 2024 and relied on a loop of fake listeners and royalty claims:
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- Smith created thousands of fraudulent accounts on music streaming platforms.
- Software made those accounts continuously stream songs he owned. The songs were generally generated with artificial intelligence.
- He claimed royalties based on the streams attributed to those accounts.
The sentencing release says Smith spread the activity across thousands of songs to reduce the chance that one track’s streaming pattern would look unusual. In total, his bot accounts streamed hundreds of thousands of AI-generated songs billions of times.
How much money did the scam generate?
The Justice Department said the scheme generated more than $8 million in royalties. The amount ordered forfeited at sentencing—$8,091,843.64—matches the figure reported in the plea and sentencing releases.
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The indictment filed in 2024 alleged that the scheme generated more than $10 million. That was the initial charging allegation; it should not be confused with the later amount described in the plea and reflected in the forfeiture order.
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| Case stage | Reported figure | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| 2024 indictment | More than $10 million | Initial allegation in the charging document. |
| March 19, 2026 guilty plea | More than $8 million in royalties; $8,091,843.64 in forfeiture | Figures in the Justice Department’s plea announcement. |
| October 6, 2026 sentence | $8,091,843.64 in forfeiture | Amount the court ordered Smith to forfeit. |
The figures come from different stages of the case: the indictment set out the original allegation, while the plea and sentencing announcements described the later outcome. The indictment’s larger figure is not the final adjudicated total.
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Why did fake streams harm other artists?
The indictment describes royalty pools allocated proportionately according to streaming activity. Under the mechanism described in this case, inflating one catalog’s share with fake streams can divert money from artists and songwriters whose music was actually played by listeners.
The specific allocation methods can differ by service and royalty category; the indictment’s explanation should not be taken as a claim that every platform uses one identical formula.
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The sentencing release illustrated the scale with an April 2023 comparison: Smith’s accounts generated 80.9 million YouTube Music family-plan streams that month, while Taylor Swift’s entire catalogue received 9.3 million streams from family plans on the service.
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Jamie McDonald, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, said: “Michael Smith exploited super intelligence technology to generate a fraud.”
McDonald also said: “By flooding music streaming platforms with automated bots in the place of consumers, and fake songs in the place of creativity, Smith robbed millions in royalty payments from genuine artists and their fans.” These are McDonald’s statements in the Justice Department’s sentencing release, not wording from the court.
Quick Recap
Case timeline
- 2017–2024: Period the Justice Department says the scheme operated.
- 2024: The indictment alleged more than $10 million in royalties.
- March 19, 2026: Smith pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud; the plea announcement described more than $8 million in royalties and $8,091,843.64 in forfeiture.
- October 6, 2026: Smith was sentenced to 18 months in prison, two years of supervised release, and forfeiture of $8,091,843.64.
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