A digital rights group has stated to have scraped a vast number of tracks from Spotify and is preparing to publish them online.
Possible Boost for AI Training
Observers noted the apparent data breach could aid artificial intelligence firms looking for data to develop their models.
A group known as Anna’s Archive said it had scraped 86 million audio tracks from the platform and 256 million entries of associated data such as performer and album names. Spotify, which carries more than 100 million tracks, confirmed that the breach did not constitute its full catalog.
“We have located and disabled the nefarious user accounts that were involved in illegal scraping,” stated a Spotify spokesperson.
The Swedish service, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, added that an inquiry into unauthorised access identified a external actor collected public metadata and used questionable tactics to circumvent DRM [digital rights management].
Archive's Stated Mission and Concerns
The streaming service does not think the music taken by Anna’s Archive has been released yet. Anna’s Archive, which is known for providing links to pirated books, wrote in a blog it wanted to create a ‘historical repository’ for music.
The group claimed the audio files represented 99.6% of all music listened to by its listeners and would be distributed via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, 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 fantastic beginning,” commented Anna’s Archive, which describes its purpose as “safeguarding humanity’s information and heritage”.
AI Training and Copyright Battleground
A composer and campaigner for protecting artists’ rights, remarked the leaked music would likely be used for training artificial intelligence systems.
“Educating models on illegally sourced material is unfortunately widespread in the tech sector, so this accessed music is highly likely to end up training AI models,” he stated.
The Anna’s Archive site alludes to LibGen, a huge online repository of copyrighted books that has allegedly been leveraged by the parent company of Facebook to train its AI models.
The co-founder of an AI startup posted on the professional network that members of the public could in theory “build their own private free equivalent of Spotify”. The executive said it could also enable tech companies to “educate models on modern music at scale”.
Intellectual property law has emerged as a battleground between creatives, authors and content creators on one side and AI companies on the other.
Policy Considerations and Reactions
In the UK, 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. Virtually every respondent to a government call for evidence on the idea has backed artists’ concerns.
A government minister for science, research and technology informed parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the matter, adding that ministers would “use the time to get this right”. The government has pledged to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by next year.
