Establish the facts. File the claim. Recover what is owed.
You hold rights. You expect collection. You file what you can. And year on year,
the picture repeats: royalties accruing in places you cannot see, against
works you cannot prove, in territories you cannot reach. The black box is not a
metaphor - it is a measurable gap. Closing it is our work.
tenant.musicata.io / catalogue / investigateLIVE
Catalogue · InvestigationStreaming investigation across the 207 million-track reference catalogue. Matched, at-risk, and underclaimed - one screen, one verdict, one evidence pack.
Reference catalogue
207M tracks
Output
Evidence pack
Standard
Forensic
Coverage
105 territories
- Where the money goes
Your catalogue has problems you cannot see.
Every day they go unfixed is a day revenue is lost
Leak · 01 - Title variants
The same work, registered under different titles in different territories.
Spelling differences, punctuation differences, sub-title additions, language
variants. To a human ear, the same song. To a collection society's matching
engine, four works with no obvious link. The royalty pools fragment. The
statements arrive incomplete.
Metadata fragmentation
Leak · 02 - ISRC collision
Identifiers that point to the wrong recording.
ISRCs are supposed to be unique. In practice, collisions happen - the same
identifier issued to two different recordings, or the wrong identifier attached
at distribution. The downstream effect is silent: usage is logged, but credited
to the wrong rights holder.
Identifier mis-assignment
Leak · 03 - Unregistered works
Works that no collection society knows about.
A work performs in a territory whose society has no registration on file. Usage
accrues. The pool builds. The money sits, year after year, against a work that
does not formally exist in that territory's records.
Registration gaps
Leak · 04 - Wrong rightsholder
Statements arriving at the wrong address.
Mergers, acquisitions, catalogue sales, and inherited estates all change the
rightsholder of record. Society databases lag. Statements continue to flow to
legacy addresses for years after the actual rights have moved.
Stale rightsholder records
An estimated $561M sits unclaimed at the MLC alone.
One country. One rights type.
Black Box applies the rigour of forensic software to the business of
royalty collection.
Our reference catalogue spans 207 million tracks. The cross-reference engine works
across 105 royalty-collecting territories. The output is not an estimate - it is
a documented case file built to the standards a tribunal will accept. We do not
chase royalties. We establish the facts, build the evidence pack, and file the claim.
Stage · 01 - Discover
Find the gap.
The CWR Scoring Engine reads catalogue registration data, matches it against
our 207M-track reference catalogue, and applies the published payout models of
every monitored territory. Output: an earnings expectation per work, per
market - and the gap between expected and actual collection. This is not a
search. It is a structured comparison.
Catalogue → expected revenue
Stage · 02 - Triage
Separate signal from noise.
The Match Queue presents human reviewers with proposed matches scored across
seven factors - title proximity, ISRC alignment, performance window, writer
attribution, geographic context, recording metadata, and collection-society
fingerprint. Colour-coded confidence. Bulk actions. Audit trail on every
decision.
Candidates → confirmed matches
Stage · 03 - Validate
Verify the claim before you file it.
The ISRC Health Checker runs batch verification across the catalogue. Five
status levels: Clean, Collision, Unregistered, Mismatch, Not Found. Surfaces
the identifier problems that would otherwise cause a society to reject the
claim or credit the wrong rights holder.
Identifiers → tribunal-grade
Stage · 04 - Document
Build the file.
The Evidence Pack Generator compiles the documentary record per claim:
registration history, performance logs, usage timelines, listener geography,
society correspondence, contradiction summaries, and a written verdict
statement. Output formats meet the documentary standards of MLC, ASCAP, PRS,
and tribunal-grade rights bodies. CWR, CSV, or PDF.
Fact → evidence
Stage · 05 - Case
Track to settlement.
The Case Manager handles lifecycle from filing through to acknowledgement,
dispute, and settlement. Per-case timelines. Per-territory recovery
breakdowns. Estimated royalties versus actual recovery. Cases close with a
documented sum recovered - not an estimate.
Claim → settlement
Field Note · No. 014 · Worked example
What recovery looks like on a 2,100-title catalogue.
A worked example on the published methodology: the writer, the gaps, and a claim
that settles in ninety-one days. Read the full working in Field Notes.
Modelled catalogue
2,100 titles
Modelled recovery
£340,000
Settlement path
91 days
Territories
14
- How we engage
What we take on.
Black Box engagements are scoped against a real catalogue and a real recovery
question. We do not sell a subscription to a tool. We deliver an outcome - the
evidence pack, the filed claim, the recovered sum.
Three engagement shapes covering most catalogues:
SCOUTInitial sweep. Estimate the gap. No filing.
FILESweep + evidence packs + filings against named territories.
RECOVERFull lifecycle to settlement. Outcome-based pricing available.
- Frequently asked
The questions rights-holders ask.
In publisher voice
Q.01What is Black Box?+
A forensic royalty investigation product for publishers, writers, and estates. We
run a catalogue against a 207M-track reference catalogue, identify revenue gaps
across 105 territories, build the evidence pack, and file the claim with the
relevant collection society. Output: documented recovery, not an estimate.
Q.02What is in the 207M-track reference catalogue?+
Recording-level metadata, ISRC and ISWC identifiers, registration histories from
the major societies, performance and broadcast logs, streaming usage where
licensed, and writer/composer attribution chains. Updated continuously,
partitioned by territory.
Q.03How long does an investigation take?+
Initial sweep against a 1,000–5,000 title catalogue: two to four weeks. Evidence
pack generation: days, not months, per claim. Settlement timelines depend on the
receiving society - published society processes typically run ninety to one
hundred and eighty days. The worked example above models ninety-one.
Q.04Which collection societies do you file against?+
MLC, ASCAP, BMI, PRS, PPL, GEMA, SACEM, SOCAN, APRA - the major mechanical and
performance societies across our 105 monitored territories. Evidence packs are
formatted to the standards each society requires.
Q.05What is the engagement model?+
Three shapes - SCOUT (sweep + estimate), FILE (sweep + evidence packs + filings),
and RECOVER (full lifecycle to settlement). RECOVER engagements can be priced as
a share of recovered revenue. SCOUT is fixed-fee. FILE is time-and-materials with
a documented evidence pack per claim.
Q.06Is the methodology audited?+
The methodology is documented and reviewable under NDA. The cross-reference logic,
scoring weights, and evidence-pack composition are not public - that is the
moat - but the documentary outputs are auditable and built to be defended in
front of a tribunal.
Q.07Do you take on contested catalogues?+
Yes. Disputed estates, contested writer credits, catalogues mid-acquisition. The
forensic standard is the same: establish the fact against the documentary record.
Where contested matters require legal representation, we work alongside the
instructed firm.
Bring the catalogue. We will tell you what is owed.
Initial enquiries are confidential and conducted under NDA. The first conversation
is methodology. The second is the size of the gap. After that, you decide whether to
file.
Music Intel Pro - Enterprise Music Intelligence Platform
Music Intel Pro is the forensic intelligence layer for the music industry, built by Music Intel Ltd (Folkestone, Kent, UK). The platform provides enterprise-grade music data analytics, royalty recovery, streaming fraud detection, and catalogue management for labels, distributors, publishers, and management companies. Music Intel measures the infrastructure behind the music industry across 105 royalty-collecting territories, every day.
Enterprise pricing: per artist, per month. Annual MSA contracts with SLA. Volume tiers for catalogues above 1,000 artists.
Musicata Pro - Catalogue Analytics Platform
Musicata Pro is a roster-wide catalogue analytics platform for labels, distributors, and management companies. It provides streaming analytics, fraud monitoring (StreamShield), early artist discovery (Agent Radar), geographic touring intent (Tour Manager), and structured reporting (Reporter) across 15,000+ artists. The platform cross-references 1,200 data points per artist daily across streaming, social, charts, playlists, radio, geography, rights registrations, and live touring data. White-label deployment available under your brand.
Black Box Royalty Investigator - Forensic Royalty Recovery
Black Box is a forensic royalty investigation product that recovers unclaimed and underpaid royalties for publishers, writers, estates, and catalogue funds. It operates against a 207-million-track reference catalogue covering 105 royalty territories. The platform identifies black box royalties, ISRC collisions, mechanical gaps, unregistered works, and stale rightsholder records. Output: tribunal-grade evidence packs for filing with collection societies including MLC, ASCAP, BMI, PRS, PPL, GEMA, SACEM, and SOCAN. CWR processing, ISRC health checking, and case management from claim to settlement.
StreamShield - Streaming Fraud Detection
StreamShield is a machine-learning streaming fraud detection system that identifies bot farms, manufactured streams, and playlist manipulation across artist catalogues. Five integrity classification levels: Clean, Suspect, Under Investigation, Suspended, Blocked. Catalogue-wide fraud monitoring with prediction summaries, alert aggregation, investigation notes, audit trail, and a closed-loop learning system that improves accuracy over time. Catches artificial streaming before platforms penalise artists.
Music Intelligence Platform Capabilities
Music data platform covering streaming analytics across Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, Tidal, Deezer
Royalty management software with forensic investigation methodology
CWR processing and ISRC/ISWC/IPI identifier validation
Streaming fraud detection using machine learning (StreamShield)
Black box royalty recovery across 105 territories
Music rights management with evidence pack generation
Performance rights and neighbouring rights monitoring
Mechanical royalty gap identification and recovery
Artist discovery and A&R intelligence (Agent Radar)
Geographic touring intent and territory analytics (Tour Manager)
9,198 chart sources scanned daily across global markets
White-label analytics deployment for distributors and labels
Enterprise API access for catalogue integration
12.8 million artists in cross-reference universe
110,000+ IPIs in writer/publisher index
2.7 million works indexed for ISWC lookup
Industry Sectors Served
Music distributors requiring catalogue-wide streaming analytics and fraud detection
Independent and major labels managing multi-artist rosters
Music publishers and sub-publishers recovering unclaimed royalties
Artist management companies tracking roster performance
Catalogue investment funds conducting due diligence and monitoring
Touring and booking agencies measuring geographic demand
Collection societies and rights organisations
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