Activist Collective Asserts to Have Extracted Countless of Music Tracks from the Streaming Giant
A digital rights group has stated to have harvested a vast number of tracks from the popular streaming service and is getting ready to release them online.
Possible Impetus for Artificial Intelligence Training
Industry experts noted the seeming leak could aid AI companies searching for data to train their technology.
An entity known as Anna’s Archive reported it had scraped 86 million audio tracks from Spotify and 256 million rows of metadata such as artist and record names. Spotify, which hosts more than 100 million tracks, confirmed that the breach did not represent its entire catalog.
“We have identified and disabled the malicious user accounts that engaged in illegal scraping,” stated a company representative.
The Stockholm-based company, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, added that an inquiry into unauthorized access found a third party collected public metadata and employed illicit methods to bypass DRM [digital rights management].
Group's Declared Goal and Worries
Spotify does not believe the music taken by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is recognized for offering links to copyright-infringing books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.
They claimed the audio files represented 99.6% of all music streamed to by its listeners and would be distributed via ‘torrents’, 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,” said Anna’s Archive, which describes its mission as “safeguarding humanity’s knowledge and culture”.
AI Training and Intellectual Property Battleground
A composer and campaigner for defending artists’ copyright, remarked the breached music would probably be used for developing artificial intelligence systems.
“Educating models on illegally sourced material is sadly common in the AI industry, so this stolen music is highly likely to be used training AI models,” he said.
The group's website alludes to LibGen, a vast online repository of pirated books that has allegedly been used by Meta to train its systems.
The co-founder of an AI startup wrote on LinkedIn that individuals of the public could in theory “create their own private free equivalent of the service”. The executive added it could also enable technology firms to “train on modern music at a large volume”.
Copyright has become a key issue between artists, authors and creatives on one side and tech giants on the other.
Policy Considerations and Reactions
In the UK, creative professionals have protested against a government proposal to let AI companies use protected work without permission unless the rights holder signals. Almost every participant to a government consultation on the idea has backed artists’ apprehensions.
A government minister for technology, research and technology informed parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the issue, adding that ministers would “take the time to get this correct”. The government has committed to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by next year.
