An activist group has stated to have harvested a vast number of songs from Spotify and is preparing to release them online.
Possible Boost for Artificial Intelligence Development
Industry experts noted the seeming data breach could boost AI companies looking for data to train their technology.
An entity called Anna’s Archive reported it had scraped 86 million music files from Spotify and 256 million rows of metadata such as performer and record names. Spotify, which carries more than 100 million tracks, stated that the leak did not constitute its full inventory.
“We have identified and deactivated the malicious user accounts that engaged in unlawful scraping,” said a Spotify representative.
The Swedish service, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, added that an investigation into unauthorized access identified a external actor scraped public metadata and employed questionable tactics to circumvent DRM protections.
Archive's Declared Mission and Concerns
The streaming service does not think the music acquired by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is known for providing links to copyright-infringing books, wrote in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.
The group asserted the audio files accounted for 99.6% of all music streamed to by its listeners and would be shared via ‘torrents’, a means of sharing large digital files online.
“Naturally the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a fantastic beginning,” commented Anna’s Archive, which describes its purpose as “safeguarding humanity’s information and heritage”.
Model Development and Copyright Debate
A composer and campaigner for protecting artists’ rights, said the leaked music would probably be used for training AI models.
“Training on illegally sourced material is unfortunately common in the AI industry, so this stolen music is almost certain to end up training AI models,” he stated.
The Anna’s Archive site alludes to LibGen, a huge online repository of pirated books that has allegedly been leveraged by the parent company of Facebook to develop its AI models.
The co-founder of an artificial intelligence company posted on LinkedIn that members of the public could in principle “build their own personal free version of the service”. The executive added it could also allow technology firms to “educate models on contemporary music at a large volume”.
Intellectual property law has become a key issue between artists, writers and content creators on one side and tech giants on the other.
Policy Considerations and Responses
Across Britain, artists and writers have protested against a government proposal to let AI companies use copyright-protected work without consent unless the rights holder signals. Almost every respondent to a government call for evidence on the idea has backed artists’ concerns.
A government minister for technology, research 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 government has pledged to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by March 2025.
