An activist group has stated to have harvested millions of tracks from Spotify and is getting ready to publish them publicly.
Potential Boost for Artificial Intelligence Development
Industry experts said the seeming leak could boost artificial intelligence firms looking for data to train their technology.
An entity known as Anna’s Archive said it had scraped 86 million music files from the platform and 256 million rows of metadata such as performer and record names. Spotify, which hosts more than 100 million songs, confirmed that the leak did not represent its full inventory.
“We have identified and deactivated the malicious user accounts that were involved in illegal scraping,” stated a Spotify representative.
The Stockholm-based service, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, added that an investigation into unauthorised access identified a third party scraped public metadata and used questionable methods to circumvent DRM [digital rights management].
Archive's Declared Goal and Worries
The streaming service does not believe the music taken by Anna’s Archive has been released yet. Anna’s Archive, which is recognized for offering links to pirated books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘historical repository’ for music.
They asserted the music files represented 99.6% of all music listened to by Spotify users and would be distributed via ‘torrents’, a means of sharing large data files online.
“Of course the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a fantastic start,” said Anna’s Archive, which describes its purpose as “preserving humanity’s knowledge and heritage”.
AI Training and Copyright Battleground
A composer and campaigner for defending artists’ rights, remarked the breached music would likely be used for developing artificial intelligence systems.
“Training on pirated material is sadly common in the AI industry, so this accessed music is highly likely to be used training AI models,” he stated.
The Anna’s Archive site makes references to LibGen, a vast online archive of pirated books that has reportedly been used by the parent company of Facebook to develop its systems.
A founder of an AI startup posted on the professional network that members of the public could in principle “create their own private free version of Spotify”. The executive added it could also allow technology firms to “educate models on modern music at a large volume”.
Copyright has emerged as a battleground between artists, writers and content creators on one side and AI companies on the other.
Policy Considerations and Responses
In the UK, artists and writers have raised concerns against a ministerial proposal to allow AI companies use copyright-protected work without permission unless the owner opts out. Virtually every participant to a government call for evidence on the idea has supported artists’ apprehensions.
A government minister for technology, research and technology informed parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the matter, adding that ministers would “take the time to get this right”. The government has pledged to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by March 2025.
