Billboard Apologies for Including Deepfake Clip of Taylor Swift

Billboard could not catch a break because just after naming Taylor Swift as the second Greatest Pop Stars Of The 21st Century, they were thrown under fire for using a clip from a video that caused her trauma of unprecedented amounts.

2015 is nearly a decade ago, but the infamous VMAs incident still haunts the music industry. Everyone remembers when Kanye West interrupted young Taylor’s acceptance speech, which started the feud between them. But Kanye decided to take it two steps ahead. Not only did he release a song called Famous and used derogatory words against Taylor, but a few months later, he released a music video that featured a naked wax body of Swift right next to him. The feud from there became history, and now Billboard has scratched that wound again.

Billboard has been ranking the artists on the basis of their impact on the music industry and the world, and with each new rank, they release a video explaining why they gave them that rank. They did the same for Taylor Swift, but they made a video containing a clip from the controversial Famous music video by Kanye West featuring a naked wax figure of her.

Swifties were quick to take notice of the clip and started to drag Billboard. They threatened to cancel Billboard if they didn't release an apology. Billboard quickly reacted and took to X (formerly Twitter) to issue an apology.

We are deeply sorry to Taylor Swift and all of our readers and viewers that in a video celebrating Swift’s achievements, we included a clip that falsely depicted her. We have removed the clip from our video and sincerely regret the harm we caused with this error.

— billboard (@billboard) November 28, 2024

They even edited the video, removed the objectionable clip, and reuploaded it again. Taylor Swift has been very vocal about how she doesn’t like to be objectified on social media. Recently, a lot of objectionable deepfakes of her were circulated on social media and now this, that too from a reputed organization, raises questions and frustrations.

ALSO READ: Taylor Swift Is The Second Greatest Pop Star And Here's Why??