An activist organization has claimed to have harvested a vast number of songs from Spotify and is preparing to release them online.
Potential Boost for AI Development
Observers noted the seeming data breach could aid AI companies searching for material to train their technology.
An entity called Anna’s Archive reported it had obtained 86 million audio tracks from the platform and 256 million entries of associated data such as artist and record names. The company, which carries more than 100 million songs, stated that the breach did not constitute its entire inventory.
“We have located and disabled the nefarious user accounts that were involved in illegal scraping,” stated a company representative.
The Stockholm-based company, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, further explained that an investigation into unauthorized access found a external actor scraped public metadata and employed illicit tactics to bypass DRM [digital rights management].
Group's Stated Mission and Concerns
Spotify does not think the audio acquired by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is known for providing 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 streamed to by Spotify users and would be shared via ‘torrents’, a method of exchanging large digital files online.
“Of course Spotify 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 information and heritage”.
Model Development and Intellectual Property Debate
Ed Newton-Rex for defending artists’ rights, said the breached music would likely be used for developing AI models.
“Educating models on illegally sourced data is unfortunately common in the tech sector, so this stolen music is highly likely to end up training AI models,” he stated.
The group's website makes references to LibGen, a vast online archive of pirated books that has reportedly been leveraged by Meta to train its AI models.
A founder of an AI startup wrote on LinkedIn that members of the public could in theory “create their own personal free version of Spotify”. The executive added it could also allow tech companies to “educate models on contemporary music at scale”.
Copyright has emerged as a key issue between creatives, writers and content creators on one side and AI companies on the other.
Government Considerations and Responses
Across Britain, artists and writers have protested against a ministerial suggestion to let AI companies utilize protected work without consent unless the rights holder opts out. Virtually every participant to a government call for evidence on the idea has backed artists’ concerns.
A government minister for science, innovation and technology informed parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the issue, adding 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.
