A digital rights group has stated to have scraped a vast number of tracks from Spotify and is getting ready to release them publicly.
Possible Impetus for AI Training
Industry experts said the apparent leak could boost artificial intelligence firms searching for material to train their models.
An entity called Anna’s Archive said it had scraped 86 million music files from Spotify and 256 million entries of metadata such as artist and album names. Spotify, which carries more than 100 million songs, stated that the leak did not constitute its entire catalog.
“We have identified and deactivated the malicious user accounts that were involved in unlawful scraping,” stated a Spotify representative.
The Swedish company, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, added that an inquiry into unauthorised access found a third party scraped public metadata and employed illicit methods to circumvent DRM [digital rights management].
Group's Stated Mission and Worries
Spotify does not believe the audio taken by Anna’s Archive has been released yet. Anna’s Archive, which is known for providing 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 listened to by its listeners and would be shared via ‘torrents’, a method of sharing large digital files online.
“Naturally the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a great start,” said Anna’s Archive, which describes its mission as “safeguarding humanity’s knowledge and culture”.
AI Training and Copyright Debate
A composer and campaigner for defending artists’ rights, remarked the leaked music would likely be utilized for training AI models.
“Educating models on illegally sourced material is sadly widespread in the AI industry, so this stolen music is almost certain to end up instructing AI models,” he said.
The group's website alludes to a large online archive, a vast 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 artificial intelligence company posted on the professional network that individuals of the public could in theory “create their own private free version of the service”. He added it could also enable tech companies to “educate models on contemporary music at scale”.
Copyright has emerged as a battleground between creatives, writers and creatives on one side and AI companies on the other.
Government Proposals and Reactions
In the UK, artists and writers have protested against a ministerial proposal to let AI companies use protected work without consent unless the owner signals. Almost every participant to a government call for evidence on the idea has backed artists’ apprehensions.
The secretary of state for science, innovation and technology informed parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the issue, noting that ministers would “take the time to get this correct”. The administration has pledged to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by March 2025.
