You’re right about that! This artist https://musicbrainz.org/artist/91f6505e-f98c-489d-8842-1f423d3fd389 is not the real Kelela - MusicBrainz but snuck in there again by using a different character set (a Cyrillic K). Also, this editor (or bot) made a real mess of the actual Kelela’s discography by introducing lots of duplicate releases.
The clean up from this will be quite hellish. We’ll need to check each edit all of these the deleted editors listed above created.
Napalm comes out to take out Кelela with a funky K:
https://musicbrainz.org/artist/91f6505e-f98c-489d-8842-1f423d3fd389/open_edits
Yes, they did the same thing with “Eartheater,” using a different “ꓰ” character, and “Luna Di,” using a different “ᒪ” character. (Canceled merges for both so release removals will delete the duplicate artists.)
The other odd thing they’re repeatedly doing is swapping the last two digits of barcodes, such as Edit #150061938.
They have done this with a number of artists. They have the alt character set to hand in their armoury. Just feels like something they fed the bot to attempt to hide what they were doing.
And a https://musicbrainz.org/artist/74a114fa-b198-4b44-ad8e-c1492b87a8df with a dodgy “L”
Another Remove list: https://musicbrainz.org/artist/74a114fa-b198-4b44-ad8e-c1492b87a8df/open_edits , https://musicbrainz.org/artist/55d13af8-7586-4de0-80e1-6f5745e0d8b2/open_edits
Edit: I think this sprinkling of napalm to clean up picks up most of the rest of the bogus releases that isn’t already in @chaban’s Going nuclear list above.
Once the Releases are deleted, the related artists and recordings will vaporise due to not being linked to anything real.
This particular saga might need to be split off into its own discussion, but I observed two more weird things. This label https://musicbrainz.org/label/f94853ab-ac1e-45ab-ac5e-af250d87db46 had some invisible characters inserted into its name to make it hard to search, a different technique. It was used for this release Release “CUT 4 ME” by Kelela - MusicBrainz that I am merging into the one it duplicates. The editor also transposed the last two digits of the barcode to avoid it being flagged as a duplicate. There are several other fake releases of Kelela’s that do that, but this is the only one I saw with a fake record label.
I noticed that in a few other places too. Which is another thing that makes it weird. Why add a barcode if it is then incorrect?
Interesting spot on the label tweaking. I did look at a few of the label involved and wondered if they needed checking. That same editor created “https://musicbrainz.org/label/a9a7d6b6-6082-466a-89d2-5f37db1a1e59” but it is already in the auto-delete due to no releases… their other labels have already vapourised
If split as something like “Fake releases, need eyes on” it could be used next time this happens. @chaban points out this is regular and they may well be back soon.
A few more editors from https://musicbrainz.org/artist/d462ac0e-10ad-41c3-8b54-c9d724c62fad to add to @dashv’s list
Editor “Deleted Editor #2859278” - MusicBrainz
Editor “Deleted Editor #2859682” - MusicBrainz
More duplicated artists from these two
https://musicbrainz.org/artist/769e3610-c0d5-49e5-88a6-4d928fe1aaa8/open_edits
I think this discussion and the many more like it to come, need their on thread. This bad actor (or group of bad actors) started creating accounts on 2026-07-18 or earlier. Creative discussion into how to best detect and limit these incidents without placing a burden on new editors and this community may be need. Of course those discussions may also be monitored by the bad actors.
I went forward and moved this discussion to a new thread. This unclutters the “Requests for Votes” thread again. Would be great if someone could double check I picked the right replies, things where already interleaved with other discussion ![]()