Swedish gangs use Spotify to launder money – Kommersant

Organized crime groups in Sweden have been using Spotify for years to launder money. The newspaper reported Svenska Dagbladet, whose journalists, on condition of anonymity, spoke with four former members of various organized criminal groups and police representatives. All of them confirmed the existence of the scheme.

The scheme for laundering money using a streaming service is quite simple. Groups find an artist willing to collaborate with them. He uses the money of organized crime groups converted into cryptocurrency to launch streams on Spotify. At the same time, the bandits always sought to ensure that their fake artist was among the best on the platform in terms of the number of streams. For this, Spotify paid him a fee, and the money went back to the organized crime group. The more views, the more payouts from Spotify. The newspaper reported that in Sweden 40-60 thousand crowns ($3.6-5.4 thousand) are paid for a million plays/views.

A Swedish police source told Svenska Dagbladet that law enforcement contacted the company but received no response. The company denied this information, and also said that Spotify did not find “any data or irrefutable evidence that the platform is being used on a large scale in the manner described.” According to a Spotify spokesman, money laundering in this way is a common problem for the industry, while the company tries to track fake streams and does not pay rewards on them.

Kirill Sarkhanyants