A digital rights group has claimed to have harvested millions of tracks from Spotify and is preparing to publish them publicly.
Possible Boost for Artificial Intelligence Training
Observers noted the seeming data breach could aid AI companies searching for material to train their technology.
An entity called Anna’s Archive reported it had scraped 86 million audio tracks from Spotify and 256 million entries of metadata such as artist and album names. The company, which carries more than 100 million tracks, stated that the breach did not represent its entire catalog.
“We have identified and disabled the malicious user accounts that were involved in unlawful scraping,” stated a Spotify spokesperson.
The Swedish service, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, added that an investigation into unauthorized access found a external actor collected public metadata and employed questionable methods to circumvent DRM [digital rights management].
Group's Stated Goal and Concerns
The streaming service does not believe the audio acquired 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 ‘historical repository’ for music.
The group asserted the audio files accounted for 99.6% of all music listened to by its listeners and would be distributed via ‘torrents’, a method of exchanging large data files online.
“Of course Spotify 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”.
Model Development and Intellectual Property Battleground
Ed Newton-Rex for defending artists’ copyright, remarked the breached music would likely be utilized for developing AI models.
“Educating models on illegally sourced data is sadly widespread in the tech sector, so this stolen music is highly likely to be used training AI models,” he stated.
The Anna’s Archive site makes references to LibGen, a vast online archive of copyrighted books that has reportedly been leveraged by the parent company of Facebook to train its AI models.
The co-founder of an artificial intelligence company posted on the professional network that individuals of the public could in theory “build their own personal free version of the service”. The executive added it could also enable tech companies to “educate models on contemporary music at a large volume”.
Intellectual property law has become a battleground between artists, authors and content creators on one side and tech giants on the other.
Policy Considerations and Reactions
In the UK, artists and writers have raised concerns against a ministerial suggestion to let AI companies use copyright-protected work without consent unless the owner signals. Virtually every participant to a government call for evidence on the idea has supported artists’ concerns.
The secretary of state for technology, research and development told parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the matter, adding that ministers would “take the time to get this right”. The government has committed to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by next year.
