Advocacy Group Claims to Have Scraped Countless of Audio Files from Spotify
A digital rights group has stated to have scraped millions of tracks from the popular streaming service and is getting ready to release them publicly.
Possible Boost for AI Training
Observers noted the apparent data breach 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 the platform and 256 million entries of metadata such as artist and record names. The company, which carries more than 100 million tracks, stated that the breach did not constitute its full inventory.
“We have located and deactivated the malicious user accounts that were involved in illegal scraping,” said a Spotify representative.
The Swedish service, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, further explained that an inquiry into unauthorized access identified a third party collected public metadata and used questionable tactics to bypass DRM protections.
Archive's Stated Mission and Concerns
Spotify does not think the music acquired by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is known for offering links to pirated books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.
The group claimed the music files accounted for 99.6% of all music listened to by Spotify users and would be shared via ‘torrents’, a method of sharing large data files online.
“Naturally Spotify doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a fantastic start,” said Anna’s Archive, which describes its purpose as “preserving humanity’s information and culture”.
AI Training and Intellectual Property Debate
A composer and campaigner for defending artists’ copyright, said the leaked music would probably be used for training artificial intelligence systems.
“Training on illegally sourced data is unfortunately common in the AI industry, so this accessed music is highly likely to be used training AI models,” he said.
The group's website makes references to a large online archive, a huge online repository of pirated books that has reportedly been leveraged by Meta 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 “build their own personal free version of Spotify”. He said it could also allow technology firms to “educate models on modern music at a large volume”.
Copyright has become a key issue between artists, authors and content creators on one side and AI companies on the other.
Policy Considerations and Reactions
In the UK, creative professionals have raised concerns against a ministerial proposal to allow AI companies use protected work without permission unless the owner opts out. Virtually every participant to a government consultation on the proposal has supported artists’ apprehensions.
A government minister for science, innovation and technology told parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the matter, adding that ministers would “use the time to get this right”. The administration has committed to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by next year.
