RAYE says AI bots flooded Royal Albert Hall presale with fake sign-ups
1.8 million people signed up for 5,000 seats at RAYE's Royal Albert Hall show. Hundreds of thousands of those registrations were fakes made by scalpers using AI bots, the singer said.
RAYE published the warning on Instagram and X on October 13, ahead of the presale for her London concert. She said she had “never witnessed bots on this scale”, The Independent reported.
The presale — an early ticket window offered before general sale — ran through a sign-up page hosted by fan marketing platform co:brand, Music Business Worldwide reported. RAYE said her team went through the list by hand to filter out suspected bots and shortlist people they believed were real fans.
Those fans were due to receive a presale link and code by email at 11:45am BST, 15 minutes before the presale opened at midday. Demand did not stop there. Once the presale opened, the Royal Albert Hall website received 5 million access requests, a venue spokesperson told IQ.
The concert is titled This Symphony May Contain Hope. It takes place on October 23 at London’s Royal Albert Hall, with Metropolis Music listed as presenter.
RAYE plans to perform her second album, This Music May Contain Hope, in full with The Heritage Orchestra and Flames Collective. The hall lists the date as Friday 23 October 2026.
For fans, this means another chance is coming. General sale opens on Thursday October 15 at 10am, according to a Live Nation UK listing. With sign-ups running at 360 times the number of seats, competition will be intense.
