An activist group has stated to have harvested millions of tracks from the popular streaming service and is getting ready to publish them online.
Possible Boost for AI Training
Observers noted the apparent leak could aid artificial intelligence firms searching for data to develop their technology.
An entity known as Anna’s Archive said it had scraped 86 million audio tracks from Spotify and 256 million rows of metadata such as performer and record names. Spotify, which hosts more than 100 million tracks, stated that the breach did not represent its full inventory.
“We have identified and disabled the nefarious user accounts that were involved in unlawful scraping,” said a company representative.
The Stockholm-based service, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, added that an investigation into unauthorised access found a external actor collected public metadata and employed questionable tactics to circumvent DRM protections.
Group's Stated Mission and Concerns
Spotify does not think the music taken by Anna’s Archive has been released yet. Anna’s Archive, which is recognized for offering links to copyright-infringing books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.
They asserted the music files represented 99.6% of all music streamed to by its listeners and would be shared via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, a means of sharing large data files online.
“Naturally the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a fantastic beginning,” said Anna’s Archive, which frames its mission as “safeguarding humanity’s information and heritage”.
AI Training and Intellectual Property Battleground
Ed Newton-Rex for defending artists’ rights, remarked the leaked music would probably be utilized for training AI models.
“Educating models on pirated material is unfortunately widespread in the tech sector, so this accessed music is almost certain to be used training AI models,” he stated.
The group's website makes references to a large online archive, a vast online repository of copyrighted books that has reportedly been used by the parent company of Facebook to train its systems.
The co-founder of an artificial intelligence company posted on the professional network that members of the public could in theory “create their own private free version of Spotify”. The executive said it could also allow tech companies to “educate models on contemporary music at scale”.
Intellectual property law has emerged as a key issue between creatives, authors and content creators on one side and tech giants on the other.
Policy Considerations and Responses
Across Britain, creative professionals have protested against a ministerial suggestion to let AI companies use protected work without permission unless the rights holder opts out. Virtually every participant to a government call for evidence on the proposal has supported artists’ apprehensions.
A government minister for technology, research and development informed parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the issue, noting that ministers would “use the time to get this correct”. The administration has committed to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by next year.
