A digital rights organization has stated to have scraped a vast number of tracks from the popular streaming service and is preparing to release them publicly.
Potential Boost for AI Training
Industry experts said the apparent leak could aid artificial intelligence firms searching for material to develop their technology.
An entity known as Anna’s Archive said it had obtained 86 million music files from Spotify and 256 million entries of metadata such as performer and record names. Spotify, which carries more than 100 million songs, confirmed that the breach did not represent its entire inventory.
“We have located and deactivated the nefarious user accounts that engaged in unlawful scraping,” said a company representative.
The Stockholm-based company, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, further explained that an inquiry into unauthorised access found a external actor scraped public metadata and employed illicit methods to circumvent DRM [digital rights management].
Group's Declared Goal and Worries
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 pirated books, wrote in a blog it wanted to create a ‘historical repository’ for music.
The group claimed the music files accounted for 99.6% of all music listened to by its listeners and would be distributed via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, a method of sharing large data files online.
“Of course Spotify doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a fantastic beginning,” said Anna’s Archive, which describes its mission as “preserving humanity’s knowledge and culture”.
AI Training and Intellectual Property Battleground
Ed Newton-Rex for defending artists’ copyright, said the breached music would likely be used for developing AI models.
“Training on illegally sourced data is sadly common in the tech sector, so this accessed music is almost certain to end up training AI models,” he said.
The group's website alludes 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 the professional network that individuals of the public could in principle “create their own private free version of the service”. The executive said it could also allow technology firms to “train on modern music at scale”.
Intellectual property law has become a key issue between creatives, writers and creatives on one side and tech giants on the other.
Policy Considerations and Responses
In the UK, artists and writers have raised concerns against a government suggestion to allow AI companies use copyright-protected work without consent unless the owner signals. Virtually every participant to a government call for evidence on the proposal has backed artists’ concerns.
A government minister for science, research and technology told parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the matter, noting that ministers would “use the time to get this right”. The government has pledged to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by next year.
