A digital rights group has claimed to have harvested millions of tracks from Spotify and is preparing to release them online.
Possible Boost for AI Development
Observers said the seeming leak could aid AI companies looking for data to train their models.
A group known as Anna’s Archive said it had scraped 86 million audio tracks from Spotify and 256 million entries of metadata such as performer and record names. Spotify, which hosts more than 100 million songs, stated that the leak did not constitute its full inventory.
“We have identified and deactivated the malicious user accounts that engaged in unlawful scraping,” said a Spotify spokesperson.
The Swedish service, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, further explained that an investigation into unauthorised access found a external actor scraped public metadata and used questionable methods to bypass DRM protections.
Archive's Declared Mission and Concerns
Spotify does not believe the audio acquired by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is recognized for offering links to copyright-infringing books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘historical repository’ for music.
The group asserted the audio files accounted for 99.6% of all music listened to by Spotify users and would be shared via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, 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 great beginning,” said Anna’s Archive, which frames its mission as “safeguarding humanity’s information and culture”.
Model Development and Copyright Battleground
Ed Newton-Rex for protecting artists’ rights, remarked the leaked music would probably be utilized for training artificial intelligence systems.
“Training on illegally sourced data is sadly widespread in the tech sector, so this accessed music is almost certain to be used instructing AI models,” he said.
The Anna’s Archive site makes references to a large online archive, a huge online repository of copyrighted books that has allegedly been leveraged by Meta to develop its systems.
The co-founder of an artificial intelligence company posted on LinkedIn that members of the public could in principle “build their own private free version of Spotify”. The executive said it could also enable tech companies to “educate models on contemporary music at a large volume”.
Copyright has become a battleground between creatives, authors and creatives on one side and tech giants on the other.
Policy Considerations and Responses
Across Britain, creative professionals have raised concerns against a government proposal to let AI companies use copyright-protected work without permission unless the owner signals. Virtually every participant to a government call for evidence on the idea has backed artists’ concerns.
The secretary of state for technology, research and development told parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the issue, noting that ministers would “take the time to get this right”. The government has pledged to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by next year.
