Activist Collective Asserts to Have Scraped Countless of Music Tracks from the Streaming Giant
A digital rights group has stated to have scraped millions of tracks from Spotify and is getting ready to publish them online.
Potential Boost for AI Development
Observers noted the seeming leak could boost AI companies looking for data to develop their technology.
A group called 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, stated that the breach did not constitute its entire inventory.
“We have identified and deactivated the malicious user accounts that engaged in illegal scraping,” said a company representative.
The Swedish company, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, further explained that an investigation into unauthorised access found a third party collected public metadata and used illicit tactics to bypass DRM protections.
Group's Declared Goal and Worries
The streaming service does not think the audio taken by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is known for providing links to copyright-infringing books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.
The group claimed the audio files accounted for 99.6% of all music listened to by Spotify users and would be shared via ‘torrents’, a method of exchanging large digital 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 frames its purpose as “safeguarding humanity’s information and heritage”.
Model Development and Copyright Battleground
A composer and campaigner for defending artists’ copyright, remarked the breached music would likely be used for developing artificial intelligence systems.
“Training on pirated data is unfortunately common in the AI industry, so this accessed music is highly likely to be used instructing AI models,” he stated.
The Anna’s Archive site alludes to LibGen, a huge online archive of pirated books that has allegedly been used by Meta to train its AI models.
A founder of an AI startup posted on LinkedIn that members of the public could in theory “build their own private free equivalent of the service”. He added it could also enable technology firms to “train on modern music at a large volume”.
Copyright has become a key issue between artists, writers and creatives on one side and AI companies on the other.
Government Considerations and Responses
In the UK, artists and writers have raised concerns against a ministerial proposal to let AI companies utilize protected work without permission unless the rights holder opts out. Virtually every participant to a government call for evidence on the idea has supported artists’ apprehensions.
A government minister for science, research and development informed parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the matter, adding that ministers would “use the time to get this correct”. The government has committed to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by March 2025.
