TikTok is losing more songs over its dispute with Universal Music Group (UMG), as the social media network begins to pull songs published by UMG, the company confirmed to TechCrunch on Tuesday. The row between the two companies started last month when UMG said it had failed to agree a deal with ByteDance, the owner of TikTok, over royalties. As a result, TikTok had to remove songs owned or distributed by UMG by January 31. The company is now removing songs that have compositions controlled by Universal Music Publishing Group (UMPG).

The platform says all songs written or co-written by a songwriter signed to UMPG must be removed and all videos that feature those songs muted. Videos that include impacted songs will remain on the platform, but they won't have any sound. The company claims UMG and UMPG's catalogue represents anywhere from 20-30% of popular songs on TikTok.

This change has put in place a principle whereby TikTok shall be forced to remove songs from their platform if the original creator of the music, though signed to UMPG, contributed even to a small part of the song owned by another label. The bulk of the removal was initially experienced when UMG deleted most songs it owns and distributes, affecting many of its own artists and songwriters, but this latest development affects some signed artists to other labels.

The company insists that it needs to start erasing the songs immediately in order to be lawfully compliant and to wipe out all of the content that is licensed by UMPG by the end of February.
UMG did not comment for this story.

Last month, UMG published an open letter to artists and songwriters where it accused TikTok of trying to "bully [UMG] into accepting a deal worth less than the previous deal, far less than fair market value and not reflective of their exponential growth." The company further added that TikTok accounts for just about 1% of its total revenue.

On the same day, TikTok also issued its open letter stating "it is sad and disappointing that Universal Music Group has put their own greed above the interests of their artists and songwriters." According to the company, UMG's action were "self-serving".

Though UMG claims that the changes would not affect its revenues, they will definitely affect the artists and songwriters as they cannot anymore promote their music on one of the most popular social sites, especially one known to drive music discovery. Moreover, artists and songwriters will also lose the rights to royalties earned on TikTok.

UMG, on its part, understands these cons; however it stated in the letter to the US court that, "an overriding responsibility" it owes its artists and therefore needs to fight for the new deal which should credit them accordingly.