Advocacy Collective Asserts to Have Extracted Countless of Music Files from Spotify
An activist group has claimed to have harvested a vast number of tracks from the popular streaming service and is getting ready to release them publicly.
Potential Boost for AI Training
Observers noted the apparent leak could boost artificial intelligence firms searching for material to train their technology.
A group known as 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 represent its full catalog.
“We have identified and disabled the malicious user accounts that were involved in illegal scraping,” stated a Spotify spokesperson.
The Stockholm-based company, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, added that an investigation into unauthorized access found a third party scraped public metadata and used illicit methods to bypass DRM protections.
Archive's Declared Goal and Concerns
The streaming service does not believe the music taken by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is known for providing links to pirated books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘historical repository’ for music.
They claimed the audio files represented 99.6% of all music streamed to by its listeners and would be shared via ‘torrents’, a method of exchanging large data files online.
“Naturally Spotify doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a great beginning,” said Anna’s Archive, which frames its purpose as “preserving humanity’s knowledge and culture”.
AI Training and Intellectual Property Battleground
A composer and campaigner for defending artists’ copyright, said the leaked music would likely be utilized for developing AI models.
“Educating models on illegally sourced data is unfortunately widespread in the AI industry, so this stolen music is almost certain to end up training AI models,” he stated.
The group's website makes references to LibGen, a huge online repository of pirated books that has allegedly been leveraged by Meta to train its AI models.
A founder of an artificial intelligence company wrote on the professional network that individuals of the public could in theory “build their own personal free version of the service”. He said it could also allow technology firms to “train on contemporary music at a large volume”.
Copyright has become a battleground between creatives, writers and creatives on one side and tech giants on the other.
Policy Considerations and Responses
Across Britain, artists and writers have raised concerns against a ministerial proposal to let AI companies use copyright-protected work without permission unless the owner opts out. Almost every participant to a government call for evidence on the idea has supported artists’ concerns.
A government minister for technology, research and technology informed parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the issue, noting that ministers would “use the time to get this correct”. The administration has pledged to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by next year.
