A digital rights organization has stated to have harvested a vast number of tracks from the popular streaming service and is preparing to publish them online.
Potential Boost for Artificial Intelligence Training
Industry experts noted the apparent leak could boost artificial intelligence firms searching for material to train their models.
A group known as Anna’s Archive said it had scraped 86 million music files from Spotify and 256 million rows of metadata such as performer and album names. Spotify, which hosts more than 100 million tracks, stated that the leak did not constitute its entire inventory.
“We have located and deactivated the nefarious user accounts that were involved in illegal scraping,” said a company spokesperson.
The Stockholm-based service, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, added that an inquiry into unauthorised access identified a external actor scraped public metadata and used questionable methods to bypass DRM [digital rights management].
Group's Declared Goal and Concerns
The streaming service does not believe the audio acquired by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is recognized for offering links to copyright-infringing books, wrote in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.
The group asserted the audio files accounted for 99.6% of all music listened to by its listeners and would be shared via ‘torrents’, a method of sharing large data files online.
“Naturally the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a fantastic start,” commented Anna’s Archive, which frames its purpose as “safeguarding humanity’s information and culture”.
Model Development and Copyright Battleground
A composer and campaigner for protecting artists’ copyright, said the breached music would likely be utilized for developing artificial intelligence systems.
“Educating models on illegally sourced material is sadly widespread in the tech sector, so this accessed music is highly likely to end up training AI models,” he said.
The group's website makes references to LibGen, a huge online archive of copyrighted books that has reportedly been leveraged by the parent company of Facebook to train its AI models.
A founder of an AI startup posted on the professional network that members of the public could in principle “create their own personal free version of Spotify”. He added it could also enable tech companies to “educate models on contemporary music at scale”.
Copyright has become a battleground between creatives, authors and creatives on one side and tech giants on the other.
Policy Considerations and Reactions
Across Britain, creative professionals have protested against a government suggestion to allow AI companies utilize copyright-protected work without consent unless the owner opts out. Almost every respondent to a government consultation on the idea has backed artists’ concerns.
A government minister for science, innovation and technology told parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the issue, noting that ministers would “take the time to get this right”. The administration has committed to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by next year.
