Ariana Grande filed a lawsuit against hackers for allegedly stealing unreleased music, photographs and videos from her collaborators.
Us obtained a lawsuit filed by Grande, 33, in Los Angeles Superior Court on Monday, July 27, against multiple individuals referred to as John Does in her documents. She accused them of causing “irreparable harm” by illegally accessing “various personal digital accounts” of photographers and producers who have worked closely with her over the years.
“In 2023 alone, 45 unreleased songs belonging to Ms. Grande were hacked, stolen, and leaked by Defendants,” the documents read. “Since her music debut in 2011, hundreds of similar leaks have taken place.”
In her lawsuit, Grande’s legal team described the “malicious” content breach as “unlawful and egregious theft, dissemination, and exploitation of unreleased content.”
She accused the alleged hackers of using content “not intended for public consumption” to sell “on the dark web for significant sums of money.”
Her lawyers confirmed that Grande filed the lawsuit in hopes of finally unmasking those who have profited from stealing her private data.
Grande’s representatives offered no comment when reached by Us.
The most infamous instance of Grande’s unreleased music leaking online occurred in 2021 when her track “Fantasize” mysteriously appeared on TikTok. The song was co-written with producers Max Martin and Savan Kotecha and was intended for inclusion in an unreleased comedy project.
Grande hinted at taking legal action over the breach during a 2023 appearance on The Zach Sang Show while discussing her work with Martin, 55.
“Before I left for Wicked, the few studio sessions I did, which are all over TikTok, thank you so much,” she quipped. “I’ll see you in jail! Literally. … The thing is those [songs] were all written for a TV show for something that was not for me.”
Grande went on, “So ‘Fantasize’ comes out — comes out? Crazy. It was stolen. Thieves, pirates, hooks. Illegal. I’ll give you more to get it back. … That wasn’t my song. It wasn’t for me. It was a parody of a ‘90s girl group vibe. But they loved it. They loved it so much.”
“I was like, A) all of you are absolutely hypocrites, and B), that’s crazy. It’s so corny,” she teased. “It’s OK. I took the note and I kinda gave them Ariana’s version of that on the album.”
As she alluded to, Grande ultimately reworked some elements of “Fantasize” into her track “The Boy Is Mine,” from the 2024 studio album Eternal Sunshine.
Meanwhile, Grande — who recently rekindled her romance with ex-boyfriend Ricky Alvarez following her split from Wicked costar Ethan Slater — is currently in the midst of her Eternal Sunshine Tour. Grande has strongly hinted that she might not tour “again for a long, long, long, long time” once her current trek wraps up in London in September.
