A new survey jointly conducted by Deezer and Ipsos shows that 97% of listeners cannot distinguish between music created by artificial intelligence and works composed by humans. This has triggered concerns in the industry that AI may completely change the music creation, consumption and profit model. The survey covered eight countries, including the United States, the United Kingdom and France, with a total of 9,000 respondents. With the popularity of AI music generation tools, ethical disputes over copyright protection and artists’ livelihoods within the industry have become increasingly prominent.
The survey also shows that most listeners want AI-generated music to be clearly labeled. Deezer said that 73% of the respondents supported disclosure when recommending AI-generated songs, 45% hoped that the platform would provide filtering options, and 40% said they would skip AI-generated songs directly. In addition, about 71% of the respondents were surprised that they could not distinguish between "human music" and "AI music".
Deezer currently has 9.7 million subscribers, and the daily submission volume of AI-generated music has exceeded 50,000, accounting for one-third of the total upload volume, much higher than the 18% in April this year. To increase transparency, the company has launched a tagging system and excluded AI tracks from edited playlists and algorithm recommendations.
Deezer CEO Alexis Lanternier told Reuters: "We firmly believe that creativity comes from humans and should be protected." He also pointed out that the differential treatment of income distribution between AI music and artificial works is extremely complex, and the industry may need to make "major adjustments." Currently, Deezer has excluded "fake playback traffic" from royalty payments.
Earlier this year, "The Velvet Sundown", a band composed of AI, attracted more than 1 million monthly listeners on the Spotify platform until its AI identity was exposed. Universal Music Group recently reached a settlement over copyright disputes with AI music company Udio. Although the specific amount has not been disclosed, the two parties plan to jointly launch an AI creation platform using authorized music as training material in 2026.
On Tuesday, the German Munich Court ruled that OpenAI's ChatGPT product violated German copyright law by reproducing lyrics. OpenAI said it may appeal. Regarding the entry of AI into the media industry, consumer attitudes are still very complex. A survey conducted by Luminate in May this year showed that most audiences in the United States have a neutral or acceptable attitude toward AI's participation in film visual effects, but are skeptical about AI writing scripts and using AI actors.