An activist organization has claimed to have scraped a vast number of songs from Spotify and is preparing to publish them publicly.
Potential Impetus for AI Training
Industry experts noted the seeming leak could boost AI companies searching for data to train their technology.
An entity known as Anna’s Archive reported it had obtained 86 million audio tracks from the platform and 256 million rows of associated data such as artist and record names. Spotify, which hosts more than 100 million songs, stated that the breach did not constitute its entire catalog.
“We have identified and disabled the nefarious user accounts that engaged in unlawful scraping,” stated a Spotify representative.
The Stockholm-based company, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, further explained that an investigation into unauthorized access identified a third party collected public metadata and employed illicit tactics to bypass DRM [digital rights management].
Archive's Declared Goal and Worries
The streaming service does not think the audio taken by Anna’s Archive has been released 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 asserted the music files represented 99.6% of all music streamed to by Spotify users and would be shared via ‘torrents’, a means of exchanging large data files online.
“Naturally the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a great start,” commented Anna’s Archive, which describes its purpose as “preserving humanity’s information and heritage”.
Model Development and Intellectual Property Debate
Ed Newton-Rex for defending artists’ rights, remarked the leaked music would likely be used for developing AI models.
“Educating models on illegally sourced material is unfortunately widespread in the tech sector, so this stolen music is almost certain to be used instructing AI models,” he said.
The group's website alludes to LibGen, a huge online archive of pirated books that has allegedly been leveraged by the parent company of Facebook to train its AI models.
A founder of an AI startup wrote on LinkedIn that members of the public could in principle “create their own personal free version of the service”. The executive said 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 creatives, authors and content creators on one side and AI companies on the other.
Policy Considerations and Reactions
In the UK, creative professionals have raised concerns against a ministerial suggestion to allow AI companies use protected work without permission unless the owner opts out. Virtually every participant to a government consultation on the proposal has backed artists’ apprehensions.
The secretary of state for science, innovation and technology told parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the matter, adding that ministers would “use the time to get this right”. The government has committed to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by March 2025.
