A digital rights organization has claimed to have harvested millions of tracks from Spotify and is preparing to publish them publicly.
Possible Boost for AI Training
Observers noted the apparent data breach could boost AI companies looking for material to train their models.
An entity 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 album names. The company, which hosts more than 100 million tracks, stated that the breach did not constitute its full inventory.
“We have identified and deactivated the nefarious user accounts that were involved in unlawful scraping,” stated a company spokesperson.
The Stockholm-based service, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, added that an investigation into unauthorized access found a third party collected public metadata and employed questionable tactics to bypass DRM protections.
Archive's Stated Mission and Worries
Spotify does not believe the music acquired by Anna’s Archive has been released yet. Anna’s Archive, which is recognized for offering links to copyright-infringing books, wrote in a blog it wanted to create a ‘historical repository’ for music.
The group asserted the audio files represented 99.6% of all music listened to by Spotify users and would be shared via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, a means of exchanging large digital files online.
“Naturally the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a great start,” commented Anna’s Archive, which describes its purpose as “preserving humanity’s knowledge and heritage”.
AI Training and Copyright Debate
Ed Newton-Rex for protecting artists’ copyright, said the leaked music would likely be utilized for training AI models.
“Educating models on pirated material is unfortunately common in the AI industry, so this stolen music is almost certain to end up training AI models,” he stated.
The group's website alludes to LibGen, a huge online repository of copyrighted books that has allegedly been used by the parent company of Facebook to train its systems.
The co-founder of an artificial intelligence company wrote on the professional network that individuals of the public could in principle “create their own personal free equivalent of Spotify”. The executive said it could also enable technology firms to “educate models on contemporary music at scale”.
Copyright has become a key issue between creatives, 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 suggestion to let AI companies use copyright-protected work without consent unless the owner opts out. Virtually every respondent to a government consultation on the idea has backed artists’ concerns.
A government minister for technology, innovation and development told parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the issue, adding that ministers would “use the time to get this correct”. The government has pledged to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by next year.
