Activist Collective Claims to Have Scraped Millions of Music Tracks from Spotify
An activist organization has stated to have scraped millions of songs from Spotify and is preparing to publish them publicly.
Possible Boost for Artificial Intelligence Development
Industry experts noted the seeming leak could boost artificial intelligence firms searching for data to develop their models.
An entity known as Anna’s Archive reported it had obtained 86 million audio tracks from Spotify and 256 million entries of metadata such as performer and album names. The company, which carries more than 100 million songs, confirmed that the breach did not represent its full inventory.
“We have identified and deactivated the nefarious user accounts that were involved in illegal scraping,” stated a Spotify spokesperson.
The Swedish company, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, added that an inquiry into unauthorized access found a third party collected public metadata and used questionable methods to circumvent DRM protections.
Archive's Declared Mission and Worries
Spotify does not think the audio taken by Anna’s Archive has been released yet. Anna’s Archive, which is recognized for offering links to pirated books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.
The group claimed the music files accounted for 99.6% of all music streamed to by Spotify users and would be distributed via ‘torrents’, a method of sharing large data files online.
“Of course the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a great beginning,” commented Anna’s Archive, which describes its mission as “safeguarding humanity’s knowledge and culture”.
AI Training and Intellectual Property Debate
A composer and campaigner for defending artists’ rights, said the breached music would likely be used for training AI models.
“Training on pirated data is sadly widespread in the AI industry, so this stolen music is highly likely to be used training AI models,” he stated.
The group's website makes references to a large online archive, a huge online repository of pirated books that has allegedly been used by Meta to train its systems.
A founder of an artificial intelligence company posted on LinkedIn that members of the public could in theory “build their own private free equivalent of Spotify”. The executive added it could also allow tech companies to “educate models on modern music at a large volume”.
Intellectual property law has become a key issue between creatives, writers and creatives on one side and tech giants on the other.
Government Proposals and Reactions
Across Britain, artists and writers have raised concerns against a ministerial proposal to allow AI companies utilize protected work without permission unless the rights holder opts out. Almost every participant to a government consultation on the idea has backed artists’ concerns.
A government minister for science, research and development told parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the matter, adding that ministers would “use the time to get this correct”. The administration has committed to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by next year.
