Who’s going to stop Spotify’s viral rap impersonators?

Pitchfork:

There’s a rapper on Spotify named Lil Kambo who’s racked up 2 million streams and counting on his song “Kid Carti.” This would be a significant feat for any unsigned, self-releasing artist in the modern day.

The only problem is that “Lil Kambo” doesn’t exist and “Kid Carti” is a pitch-shifted leak of Playboi Carti’s yet-unreleased track “Kid Cudi” (previously referred to as “Pissy Pamper”), a song the rapper’s been teasing for some time and even playing out live. Lil Kambo isn’t a viral hit—he’s a fraudster.

And:

Fraudulent releases are nothing new on sites like YouTube and SoundCloud. But these recent unauthorized uploads, as demonstrated by the unauthorized Beyoncé and SZA releases back in December and a “Fenty Fantasia” leak of Rihanna songs in March are indicative of a growing trend that’s only grown more apparent in the past several months: leaks or unreleased snippets that make their way to “legitimate” streaming platforms, racking monetized streams by fans eager to consume that content regardless of who owns it or who benefits from the plays.

Bottom line, these fakes hurt both the original artists they’re lifted from, but also pollute the marketplace.

One final point:

As of May 22, fraudulent music on the profiles of Lil Kambo, Unocarti, and Unocompac have been removed from Spotify. The artist profile for Unocompac on Apple Music still features leaks, available to listen on the platform.

It’s a whack-a-mole problem. Seems like there should be a unified process for reporting and removing content like this. A takedown notice of piracy on one platform, once verified, could automatically trigger the takedown of that content on all the music services. Impossible? Overreaching?