A digital rights group has claimed to have harvested millions of tracks from Spotify and is preparing to publish them publicly.
Possible Boost for Artificial Intelligence Training
Industry experts said the apparent data breach could aid artificial intelligence firms searching for data to develop their technology.
An entity called Anna’s Archive said it had obtained 86 million audio tracks from the platform and 256 million entries of metadata such as performer and album names. Spotify, which carries more than 100 million tracks, confirmed that the breach did not represent its full inventory.
“We have identified and disabled the malicious user accounts that engaged in unlawful scraping,” said a company spokesperson.
The Stockholm-based service, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, further explained that an inquiry into unauthorized access identified a external actor scraped public metadata and used illicit methods to bypass DRM [digital rights management].
Group's Declared Mission and Concerns
The streaming service does not believe the audio acquired by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is known for offering links to pirated books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.
The group asserted the music files accounted for 99.6% of all music streamed to by Spotify users and would be distributed via ‘torrents’, a method of exchanging large data files online.
“Of course Spotify doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a fantastic start,” commented Anna’s Archive, which frames its purpose as “safeguarding humanity’s information and culture”.
Model Development and Intellectual Property Battleground
Ed Newton-Rex for protecting artists’ rights, remarked the leaked music would likely be utilized for training AI models.
“Training on pirated material is unfortunately common in the tech sector, so this accessed music is highly likely to end up training AI models,” he stated.
The group's website makes references to a large online archive, a vast online archive of pirated books that has allegedly been used by Meta to develop its systems.
A founder of an AI startup posted on the professional network that members of the public could in principle “build their own personal free version of Spotify”. He said it could also enable tech companies to “educate models on modern music at a large volume”.
Copyright has emerged as a key issue between artists, authors and creatives on one side and tech giants on the other.
Government Proposals and Reactions
Across Britain, artists and writers have protested against a government suggestion to allow AI companies use copyright-protected work without consent unless the rights holder opts out. Almost every participant to a government consultation on the idea has backed artists’ apprehensions.
The secretary of state for science, research and technology informed parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the issue, adding that ministers would “take the time to get this right”. The administration has pledged to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by March 2025.
