An activist group has claimed to have harvested millions of tracks from Spotify and is preparing to release them publicly.
Potential Boost for Artificial Intelligence Training
Observers said the apparent data breach could boost artificial intelligence firms searching for material to develop their technology.
An entity known as Anna’s Archive said it had scraped 86 million music files from the platform and 256 million rows of associated data such as performer and album names. Spotify, which hosts more than 100 million songs, stated that the breach did not constitute its full inventory.
“We have identified and disabled the nefarious user accounts that engaged in unlawful scraping,” stated a company representative.
The Stockholm-based service, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, added that an investigation into unauthorized access found a external actor collected public metadata and employed illicit tactics to circumvent DRM [digital rights management].
Group's Stated Goal and Worries
The streaming service does not believe the music taken 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.
The group claimed the music files represented 99.6% of all music listened to by Spotify users and would be distributed via ‘torrents’, a means of exchanging large digital files online.
“Of course the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a great start,” said Anna’s Archive, which frames its mission as “safeguarding humanity’s information and heritage”.
AI Training and Intellectual Property Battleground
Ed Newton-Rex for protecting artists’ rights, remarked the leaked music would likely be used for developing AI models.
“Training on pirated material is unfortunately common in the AI industry, so this stolen music is almost certain to be used training AI models,” he said.
The Anna’s Archive site makes references to LibGen, a vast online repository of copyrighted books that has reportedly been leveraged by Meta to train its systems.
A founder of an AI startup wrote on the professional network that individuals of the public could in theory “create their own private free equivalent of the service”. The executive added it could also allow tech companies to “educate models on modern music at a large volume”.
Intellectual property law has emerged as a key issue between artists, writers and content creators on one side and tech giants on the other.
Government Proposals and Reactions
Across Britain, creative professionals have raised concerns against a government suggestion to allow 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 development told parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the issue, adding that ministers would “use the time to get this right”. The government has pledged to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by next year.
