North Carolina Man Sentenced to 18 Months for $10 Million AI-Powered Music Streaming Fraud

A North Carolina musician became the first person in the United States to face criminal prosecution for AI-assisted music streaming royalty fraud, receiving an 18-month prison sentence after admitting to orchestrating a decade-long scheme that generated hundreds of thousands of artificial songs and used thousands of automated bot accounts to fraudulently collect over $10 million. Michael Smith, 54, of Cornelius, North Carolina, pleaded guilty in March 2026 to conspiracy to commit wire fraud and was sentenced on October 6, 2026, making his case a watershed moment in the intersection of artificial intelligence, digital music platforms, and criminal fraud.