An activist group has stated to have scraped millions of songs from Spotify and is getting ready to release them online.
Potential Impetus for Artificial Intelligence Training
Industry experts noted the apparent leak could aid AI companies looking for data to develop their models.
A group known as Anna’s Archive reported it had obtained 86 million audio tracks from the platform and 256 million entries of metadata such as performer and album names. The company, which carries more than 100 million tracks, stated that the leak did not represent its full catalog.
“We have identified and disabled the nefarious user accounts that were involved in unlawful scraping,” said a Spotify representative.
The Stockholm-based service, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, further explained that an investigation into unauthorised access found a third party scraped public metadata and employed illicit methods to circumvent DRM [digital rights management].
Archive's Stated Goal and Concerns
The streaming service does not believe the music acquired by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is known for providing links to pirated books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.
They asserted the audio files represented 99.6% of all music listened to by Spotify users and would be distributed via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, a means of sharing large digital files online.
“Of course the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a fantastic beginning,” commented Anna’s Archive, which describes its purpose as “safeguarding humanity’s information and culture”.
AI Training and Copyright Debate
A composer and campaigner for defending artists’ rights, said the breached music would likely be utilized for developing AI models.
“Educating models on pirated data is unfortunately widespread in the AI industry, so this stolen music is highly likely to end up instructing AI models,” he said.
The Anna’s Archive site alludes to LibGen, a vast online repository of pirated books that has allegedly been leveraged by Meta to train its AI models.
A founder of an AI startup wrote on LinkedIn that individuals of the public could in principle “create their own private free equivalent of the service”. The executive said it could also allow technology firms to “educate models on modern music at a large volume”.
Intellectual property law has become a battleground between artists, writers and creatives on one side and AI companies on the other.
Government Proposals and Responses
In the UK, creative professionals have raised concerns against a government proposal to allow AI companies utilize copyright-protected work without consent unless the owner opts out. Virtually every participant to a government call for evidence on the idea has backed artists’ apprehensions.
The secretary of state for science, research and development told parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the matter, adding that ministers would “take the time to get this right”. The government has committed to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by next year.
