Advocacy Collective Asserts to Have Scraped Countless of Audio Files from the Streaming Giant
A digital rights organization has claimed to have scraped millions of tracks from the popular streaming service and is preparing to publish them online.
Potential Boost for Artificial Intelligence Development
Industry experts said the seeming data breach could aid AI companies looking for material to develop their technology.
A group known as Anna’s Archive reported it had obtained 86 million audio tracks from Spotify and 256 million rows of metadata such as artist and album names. The company, which hosts more than 100 million tracks, confirmed that the breach did not represent its entire catalog.
“We have located and deactivated the nefarious user accounts that engaged in illegal scraping,” said a Spotify spokesperson.
The Stockholm-based service, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, added that an inquiry into unauthorized access found a third party scraped public metadata and employed questionable tactics to circumvent DRM protections.
Archive's Declared Mission and Worries
Spotify does not think the audio acquired by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is recognized for providing links to copyright-infringing books, wrote in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.
The group asserted the music files represented 99.6% of all music listened to by Spotify users and would be distributed via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, a method of sharing large data files online.
“Of course Spotify doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a fantastic beginning,” commented Anna’s Archive, which frames its mission as “safeguarding humanity’s information and culture”.
AI Training and Intellectual Property Debate
A composer and campaigner for protecting artists’ rights, said the leaked music would likely be utilized for training AI models.
“Training on illegally sourced material is sadly common in the AI industry, so this stolen music is almost certain to be used instructing AI models,” he stated.
The group's website alludes to a large online archive, a huge online archive of pirated books that has reportedly been leveraged by Meta to train its systems.
The co-founder of an AI startup posted on the professional network that individuals of the public could in principle “build their own personal free version of Spotify”. He said it could also enable technology firms to “educate models on modern music at scale”.
Copyright has emerged as a key issue between artists, authors and content creators on one side and tech giants on the other.
Government Proposals and Responses
In the UK, creative professionals have protested against a ministerial proposal to let AI companies use protected work without permission unless the owner opts out. Virtually every respondent to a government consultation on the proposal has backed artists’ concerns.
A government minister for science, research and technology informed parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the matter, adding that ministers would “take the time to get this right”. The government has pledged to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by next year.
