A digital rights organization has claimed to have scraped a vast number of tracks from Spotify and is getting ready to release them publicly.
Potential Impetus for AI Training
Observers noted the seeming data breach could aid AI companies looking for data to train their models.
A group known as Anna’s Archive said it had obtained 86 million music files from the platform and 256 million rows of metadata such as artist and record names. Spotify, which carries more than 100 million tracks, stated that the leak did not constitute its full catalog.
“We have located and disabled the malicious user accounts that engaged in unlawful scraping,” stated a Spotify spokesperson.
The Stockholm-based service, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, added that an investigation into unauthorised access identified a third party collected public metadata and used illicit tactics to bypass DRM [digital rights management].
Archive's Declared Goal and Concerns
Spotify does not think the music taken by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is recognized for providing links to copyright-infringing books, wrote in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.
The group claimed the audio files accounted for 99.6% of all music streamed to by its listeners and would be shared via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, a method of sharing large data files online.
“Naturally the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a fantastic beginning,” said Anna’s Archive, which frames its mission as “preserving humanity’s information and heritage”.
AI Training and Copyright Battleground
A composer and campaigner for protecting artists’ copyright, said the breached music would probably be used for developing artificial intelligence systems.
“Educating models on illegally sourced data is sadly common in the AI industry, so this stolen music is almost certain to end up training AI models,” he said.
The Anna’s Archive site makes references to a large online archive, a huge online repository of pirated books that has reportedly been used by Meta to train its systems.
The co-founder of an artificial intelligence company posted on the professional network that members of the public could in principle “build their own private free version of Spotify”. He said it could also enable technology firms to “train on modern music at scale”.
Intellectual property law has become a battleground between creatives, authors and content creators on one side and AI companies on the other.
Government Considerations and Reactions
In the UK, creative professionals have protested against a ministerial suggestion to allow AI companies utilize copyright-protected work without consent unless the owner signals. Almost every respondent to a government consultation on the proposal has backed artists’ concerns.
The secretary of state for technology, innovation and technology told parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the issue, adding that ministers would “take the time to get this correct”. The government has pledged to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by next year.
