When talking about bands like Threatin that essentially "bought" a fanbase, you might ask yourself how do these views get inflated, if Youtube requires people to actually watch the video or Spotify requires somebody to actually stream a song?
The answer is notorious click farms. Footage has surfaced of a Russian media outlet visiting a click farm in China with hundreds, if not thousands, of phones plugged in, all performing various tasks – from streaming music, to rating mobile apps, to inflating Youtube views.
It's pretty shocking the lengths people go to to fake an online fanbase. Noisey had a pretty great write up on various scams bands tried in recent years.
[Thanks for the tip, Ben O.]
