Spotify Faces $1.6 Billion Lawsuit Due to Lack of Licenses on Several Songs
Spotify was recently served a lawsuit that demanded up to $1.6 billion in compensation for a number of songs that the company allegedly uploaded without acquiring the proper license.
It was recently learned that Wixen Music Publishing filed a case in California against the Sweden-based music streaming giant.
The lawsuit alleged Spotify had used thousands of songs without properly getting the license to distribute them, according to The Hollywood Reporter. The case also intends to bring Spotify to court for purportedly not offering any compensation to artists whose songs were made available on the site.
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THR confirmed that Wixen had demanded injunctive relief and "at least" $1.6 billion to compensate for the damages on the music publisher, who is in charge of a number of songs from Tom Petty, David Cassidy, Tom Morello of the band Rage Against the Machine, Kim Gordon of Sonic Youth, Rivers Cuomo of Weezer and more.
Meanwhile, Spotify reportedly questioned Wixen's authority to file a case against them on behalf of the artists mentioned above.
Spotify countered that Wixen had only "assumed" their authority to file a lawsuit after sending their clients a letter "stating that it would submit Requests for Exclusion in their names unless — within a short time frame — the client affirmatively provided Wixen Music with contrary instructions."
Spotify is one of the widely used music streaming services around the world due to its availability across several platforms for different hardware products.
Through the years, Spotify faced criticisms from music artists for allowing non-paying users to listen to their full songs anytime. Fans may recall that pop singer Taylor Swift once demanded that her songs and albums be removed from Spotify's library until the release of her latest album "Reputation."
This was also not the first time Spotify has been involved in a multi-million dollar lawsuit and settlement case. It had once proposed to allocate over $43 million as a fund to compensate the songwriters who were reportedly not paid with mechanical royalties, even when Spotify used the music they created.
