A digital rights group has stated to have harvested millions of songs from Spotify and is getting ready to release them publicly.
Potential Impetus for AI Training
Observers said the apparent leak could aid AI companies looking for material to train their models.
An entity called Anna’s Archive reported it had scraped 86 million audio tracks from Spotify and 256 million entries of associated data such as artist and album names. The company, which carries more than 100 million songs, stated that the leak did not constitute its full inventory.
“We have located and deactivated the malicious user accounts that engaged in unlawful scraping,” stated a Spotify spokesperson.
The Swedish service, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, added that an inquiry into unauthorised access identified a external actor collected public metadata and used illicit tactics to circumvent DRM [digital rights management].
Archive's Stated Mission 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 recognized for offering links to copyright-infringing books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘historical repository’ for music.
They asserted the music files accounted for 99.6% of all music listened to by Spotify users and would be shared via ‘torrents’, a means of sharing large data files online.
“Naturally the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a great beginning,” said Anna’s Archive, which frames its purpose as “safeguarding humanity’s information and culture”.
AI Training and Copyright Debate
A composer and campaigner for defending artists’ rights, remarked the leaked music would probably be used for developing artificial intelligence systems.
“Educating models on illegally sourced material is unfortunately widespread in the AI industry, so this stolen music is highly likely to be used training AI models,” he stated.
The Anna’s Archive site makes references to LibGen, a vast online archive of pirated books that has allegedly been used by Meta to train its systems.
The co-founder of an AI startup posted on the professional network that members of the public could in theory “build their own personal free equivalent of Spotify”. He said it could also enable technology firms to “train on contemporary music at a large volume”.
Copyright has become a battleground between creatives, writers and content creators on one side and AI companies on the other.
Government Considerations and Responses
In the UK, creative professionals have protested against a ministerial proposal to let AI companies use protected work without permission unless the rights holder signals. Almost every participant to a government consultation on the idea has supported artists’ concerns.
A government minister for technology, innovation and development informed parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the issue, noting that ministers would “take the time to get this right”. The administration has pledged to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by next year.
