An activist group has stated to have harvested a vast number of songs from Spotify and is getting ready to publish them online.
Possible Boost for AI Development
Observers noted the seeming leak could boost AI companies looking for data to develop their models.
A group known as Anna’s Archive reported it had obtained 86 million music files from the platform and 256 million entries of associated data such as performer and album names. Spotify, which hosts more than 100 million songs, confirmed that the breach did not represent its entire catalog.
“We have located and disabled the malicious user accounts that were involved in illegal 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 bypass DRM [digital rights management].
Archive's Declared Mission and Worries
The streaming service does not believe the music acquired by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is recognized for offering links to pirated books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘historical repository’ for music.
They claimed the music files accounted for 99.6% of all music streamed to by its listeners and would be distributed via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, a means of sharing large digital files online.
“Of course Spotify doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a great start,” commented Anna’s Archive, which frames its mission as “preserving humanity’s information and culture”.
AI Training and Copyright Battleground
Ed Newton-Rex for defending artists’ copyright, remarked the breached music would likely be used for developing AI models.
“Educating models on pirated material is sadly common in the tech sector, so this accessed music is almost certain to end up instructing AI models,” he stated.
The group's website alludes to a large online archive, a vast online archive of pirated books that has allegedly been used by the parent company of Facebook to train its systems.
The co-founder of an artificial intelligence company wrote on the professional network that members of the public could in theory “create their own private free equivalent of Spotify”. The executive added it could also enable technology firms to “train on contemporary music at scale”.
Copyright has become a battleground between creatives, writers and creatives on one side and tech giants on the other.
Policy Proposals and Reactions
In the UK, artists and writers have protested against a government suggestion to allow AI companies use protected work without permission unless the owner signals. Almost every respondent to a government consultation on the idea has backed artists’ apprehensions.
The secretary of state for science, research and technology told parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the matter, noting that ministers would “use the time to get this right”. The government has committed to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by next year.
