📑 Sections (7)

6. AI: declaring and protecting

What platforms ask if you used AI, what can really be done to limit training on your music and what doesn't work.

This topic changes month to month, and there are two different questions: how to declare if you used AI and how to keep your music from being used to train it. The first already has rules. The second has few tools, and it’s worth knowing how far they go.

Declaring AI use

  • Spotify: has had AI Credits since April 2026, to indicate in which roles or instruments AI was used, shown in the song’s credits. According to Spotify, declaring it doesn’t penalize or down-rank the song.
  • Apple Music: launched Transparency Tags in March 2026. In August it told distributors they’ll become mandatory when AI created a “material portion” of the content, and that they’ll be shown to the public. It set no percentage.
  • Deezer: detects AI-generated music on its own, and removes it from recommendations.
  • Tidal: according to published reports, since July 2026 it doesn’t monetize music generated entirely with AI. AI-assisted music still gets paid.
  • Bandcamp: prohibits music generated wholly or in substantial part with AI.
  • TikTok: its music terms ask you to disclose AI use in videos and to have permission to use a voice or image.

The declaration is made with your distributor, and each offers it differently. Some also restrict AI-made music on their own: check their rules.

What do I declare?

  • A whole song or a voice generated with AI: declare it.
  • An important part: generated lyrics, a track or cover art. Declare it.
  • Helper tools, like separating tracks, reducing noise or tuning: there’s no single criterion yet. Apple talks about a “material portion”. When in doubt, check your distributor’s guidelines.

What isn’t allowed

  • Cloning a voice without authorization: Spotify only allows imitating a voice if the artist authorized it.
  • Mass uploads, duplicates or very short tracks to earn more: spam filters target this.
  • Publishing on another artist’s profile.

If your music is your own, a spam filter shouldn’t affect you, but publishing many nearly identical songs in a short time can look suspicious.

Protecting your music from training

Let’s be clear: today there’s no universal button, and once a model has been trained, it can’t be “untrained”.

What you can do

  1. Read your distributor’s and each platform’s terms, and turn off any AI training license you don’t want to grant. It’s the point with the most effect, because it’s your contract. Some platforms have explicit stances: Bandcamp says it doesn’t train models on your music without permission, and SoundCloud moved to asking for consent.
  2. On your website, block known AI crawlers in robots.txt and add a machine-readable reservation, such as TDMRep.
  3. Reserve your rights in writing on your site and in your contracts.
  4. If you live or publish in the European Union, the text and data mining exception allows you to reserve your rights, as long as it’s machine-readable.
  5. Register your works: if there’s a future claim or agreement, having everything registered helps.

Where it’s going

Major labels have already signed deals with services like Suno and Udio. Warner said its artists will be able to choose whether to take part, but that depends on each contract and doesn’t reach those who publish on their own. If your distributor offers you any such deal, read it before accepting.

What not to expect

  • A watermark doesn’t prevent training. It can help identify audio, but it doesn’t block anything.
  • Content Credentials (C2PA) indicate a file’s origin. They aren’t a do-not-train order.
  • Voluntary registries like Spawning’s Do Not Train depend on each company respecting them.
  • robots.txt only applies to your site. What’s on platforms depends on their terms.
🔵 Can wait· in distribution

What's urgent is not giving up rights without realizing it, and that gets checked when choosing a distributor. The other measures have limited reach and shouldn't hold up your release.

Common mistakes

Quick path: AI

Quick path

  1. If you used AI in an important part, declare it with the distributor.
  2. Read what their terms say about AI training.
  3. Turn off any license you don't want to grant.
  4. Block AI crawlers on your website, if you have one.
  5. Register your works.
  6. Review the policies before each release.

Expected result

Expected result

Your release meets what platforms ask, you didn’t give up rights by accident, and you know the real reach of these protections. With this you close the complete journey: from the first take to the published song.