An activist group has claimed to have scraped millions of songs from Spotify and is getting ready to publish them online.
Potential Boost for AI Training
Observers said the seeming data breach could boost AI companies looking for data to develop their technology.
A group known as Anna’s Archive said it had scraped 86 million music files from the platform and 256 million entries of metadata such as performer and album names. The company, which hosts more than 100 million songs, stated that the breach did not represent its full catalog.
“We have identified and deactivated the malicious user accounts that were involved in unlawful scraping,” stated a company spokesperson.
The Stockholm-based service, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, further explained that an investigation into unauthorised access identified a external actor collected public metadata and used questionable methods to circumvent DRM [digital rights management].
Group's Declared Goal and Concerns
Spotify does not think the music acquired by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is recognized for providing links to pirated books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.
The group claimed the audio files accounted for 99.6% of all music listened to by its listeners and would be shared via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, a method of exchanging large data files online.
“Naturally the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a great beginning,” commented Anna’s Archive, which frames its purpose as “preserving humanity’s knowledge and culture”.
AI Training and Copyright Battleground
Ed Newton-Rex for protecting artists’ rights, said the leaked music would likely be used for developing AI models.
“Educating models on pirated data is unfortunately widespread in the tech sector, so this accessed music is highly likely to be used training AI models,” he said.
The group's website makes references to a large online archive, a huge online archive of copyrighted books that has reportedly been leveraged by the parent company of Facebook to train its AI models.
A founder of an artificial intelligence company wrote on LinkedIn that individuals of the public could in theory “build their own personal free version of Spotify”. The executive said it could also allow tech companies to “educate models on modern music at a large volume”.
Copyright has become a battleground between artists, authors and creatives on one side and tech giants on the other.
Policy Considerations and Responses
Across Britain, creative professionals have protested against a government suggestion to let AI companies utilize protected work without consent unless the owner opts out. Virtually every respondent to a government consultation on the proposal has supported artists’ concerns.
A government minister for science, research and technology informed parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the matter, adding that ministers would “take the time to get this right”. The government has committed to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by March 2025.
