Getting paid for your work should be simple. A core part of SoundExchange’s mission is making sure digital performance royalties reach the right people. That means maintaining a royalty collection and distribution process that is both accessible and secure.
Recently, we’ve introduced an improvement aimed at accomplishing both of those goals.
SoundExchange has partnered with Stripe Identity to improve the identity verification process for registered SoundExchange creators. Now, creators will be guided through a streamlined identity verification process when registering with SoundExchange or managing digital royalty payments online through SX Direct.
Doing so adds additional security and anti-fraud measures that protect SoundExchange and our registrants while making the verification process faster and simpler.
Protecting Creators
At SoundExchange, we make the business side of music easier to navigate. We collect digital royalty payments on behalf of our creators – in the U.S. market and internationally. In order to protect our creators, we ensure that only authorized users can register and make changes to account details, including banking information. Identity verification is a critical step to protect against unauthorized access and prevent fraud.
In the past, confirming a creator’s identity required manual review of submitted documents, which affected how quickly members could get set up and start collecting payments.
Now, with an automated identity verification process powered by Stripe Identity, SoundExchange is enabling a faster, more secure process for creators. This reduces the need for manual reviews for successfully verified identities and frees up resources for reviewing unverified ones.
How It Works
For creators who are 18 or older and have an identity document from a supported country, the process happens entirely within the Stripe verification window in SX Direct or in our online registration tool.
After providing a few basic details, like legal name, date of birth, and country of residence, creators will be guided to the verification step and prompted to provide an ID. From there, creators can use either a mobile device to photograph an ID document or upload an image from a computer. Creators who are registering themselves will also complete a simple selfie to confirm their identity matches the document. SoundExchange requires Stripe ID to delete all personal data after the verification process is completed. .
For creators who are minors, are from a country not yet covered by Stripe’s service, or don’t wish to use the automated ID verification process, the existing document upload and manual review process remains available.
To help ensure a smooth ID verification process, we recommend the following best practices:
- Keep the Stripe window open until verification has been completed
- Take selfies in a well-lit area for the best results
- Use a mobile device instead of a webcam to take a photo of ID, laying it flat instead of holding it up
This update is part of our ongoing effort to build a digital royalty collection and distribution service that’s faster, more secure, and less burdensome for creators and rights holders.