Ariana Grande has filed a lawsuit against unidentified individuals she alleges hacked the digital accounts of her collaborators and stole unreleased music, photos and other private material before selling it online.
The lawsuit, filed on Monday in Los Angeles County Superior Court, names John Doe 1 and John Does 2 through 100 as defendants. It accuses them of invasion of privacy, violating California's Comprehensive Data Access and Fraud Act, and conversion.
According to the complaint, the defendants targeted photographers and producers who worked with Grande, using phishing scams and other unauthorised methods to gain access to their digital accounts and devices.
The alleged theft includes unreleased songs, demo recordings, footage from recording sessions, music videos, behind-the-scenes photos and album outtakes dating from 2019 to 2024.
The lawsuit claims that in 2023 alone, 45 unreleased songs were stolen and leaked. It also alleges that hackers accessed a photographer's Dropbox account in 2019 to obtain unreleased images before compromising a producer's mobile device the following year, gaining access to demos, master recordings and studio footage.
Grande further alleges that phishing attacks carried out in January and February 2024 enabled the group to obtain additional private photographs by impersonating one of her photographers through a fake Gmail account and domain name.
According to the complaint, the stolen material was sold in batches through third-party payment services, including PayPal and Cash App, before being distributed across multiple online platforms.
Grande says the leaks have disrupted her creative process, damaged business relationships and forced her to re-record material and alter the release schedule for upcoming projects.
She also alleges the incidents caused financial and reputational harm and required significant resources to investigate the alleged activity and remove leaked content.
The singer is seeking a court order requiring the defendants to return her private material, prevent any further distribution of the content and reveal the identities of those allegedly responsible.
Grande has previously spoken about the impact of music leaks. During a 2024 interview on the Zach Sang Show, she described the online release of her unreleased track Fantasize as the work of "thieves, pirates, crooks" after the song gained popularity on TikTok, despite never being intended for official release.
Although frustrated by the leak, Grande later said the public's response to Fantasize influenced elements of the music she went on to create for her 2024 album Eternal Sunshine.
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