D4vd's Apple Music page reportedly hacked amid murder charges - BBC

ShareSaveAdd as preferred on GoogleMark SavageMusic correspondentGetty ImagesD4vd is currently in jail while awaiting trial on murder chargesThe Apple Music page for US singer D4vd was apparently hacked over the weekend, with a song titled I Did It added to his discography. The musician, whose real name is David Anthony Burke, is currently in jail on charges of murdering and sexually abusing a 14-year-old girl, named Celeste Rivas Hernandez. The teenager's body was found last year inside a Tesla registered to Burke. He has denied all the charges against him. A picture of the abandoned Tesla was used as the artwork for I Did It, which has subsequently been removed from Apple Music. The song appeared to be a version of an unreleased track called Celeste, which D4vd allegedly recorded in 2023. In the lyrics, the singer professes his love for a girl called Celeste over a melancholy piano line, saying: "I hear her voice each time I take a breath". The song first leaked online in December 2023, but was never officially released. Burke has never acknowledged the leaked track was his work, and there is no confirmation that the Celeste mentioned in the song is Celeste Rivas. D4vd's account was not the only high-profile page on Apple Music to be hacked over the weekend. A separate song, whose title used a racial slur, appeared on the pages of both Ariana Grande and the girl group Katseye on Sunday. Both have also been removed, and there is no indication the incidents are related to the D4vd song. The BBC has contacted Apple Music to ask for more details. Surprisingly, it is not unusual for high-profile artists to have fake songs added to their streaming catalogues. In 2023, an AI-generated "duet" between Drake and The Weeknd was removed from Spotify, Apple Music and Amazon Music after their record label, Universal, said the song violated copyright law. A-list stars including Beyoncé, Harry Styles and Queen have also had AI music added to their profile pages - but the practice has also affected artists with more niche followings, including the late country star Blaze Foley and folk singer Emily Portman. In a separate scam, some artists have uploaded songs that falsely claim to be collaborations with higher-profile musicians. In each case, the songs are suggested to fans of the real artist - and generate royalty payments for the counterfeiters. The fake tracks are exploiting a loophole in the way audio files are uploaded to streaming services. Distributors are asked to provide the metadata for each individual song, which makes it possible for a bad actor to submit music using an existing artist's name, or one with a very similar spelling. Because the process is largely automated, fake tracks often remain online until a rights-owner spots them and alerts the platform. Earlier this year, Sony Music told the BBC it had requested the removal of more than 135,000 songs by people impersonating its artists on streaming services. Spotify has also acknowledged the problem, revealing last September that it had removed more than 75 million "spammy tracks" over the previous 12 months. In response, it launched a tool called Artist Profile Protection in March, which allows certain musicians to review any new additions before they are added to their pages. Even so, another fake D4vd song, titled Marcescence, was added to the star's Spotify profile on 18 July. It remained live for eight hours before being removed. D4vd, who rose to fame on TikTok with the viral hits Romantic Homicide and Here With Me, was on tour when police found Rivas Hernandez's body in the front boot of his Tesla in September 2025 - the day after she would have turned 15. His worldwide tour was cancelled and he largely retreated from public life and social media. Police announced his arrest in April this year; and prosecutors began laying out their case against the singer at a preliminary trial last week. They allege that Burke killed Rivas Hernandez after she threatened to destroy his career by revealing he had been abusing a minor. He denies the charges. A judge will decide whether the case should go to trial after preliminary hearings conclude this week.