A digital rights group has claimed to have scraped millions of tracks from Spotify and is preparing to publish them publicly.
Possible Impetus for Artificial Intelligence Training
Industry experts said the apparent leak could boost artificial intelligence firms looking for data to train their models.
An entity known as Anna’s Archive said it had scraped 86 million music files from Spotify and 256 million rows of metadata such as artist and record names. The company, which hosts more than 100 million tracks, stated that the leak did not represent its full inventory.
“We have located and deactivated the nefarious user accounts that engaged in illegal scraping,” stated a Spotify spokesperson.
The Swedish service, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, added that an investigation into unauthorized access identified a external actor collected public metadata and employed questionable methods to bypass DRM protections.
Group's Stated Goal and Concerns
The streaming service does not believe the audio taken 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.
They asserted the music files represented 99.6% of all music listened to by Spotify users and would be distributed via ‘torrents’, a method of exchanging large data files online.
“Naturally the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a fantastic start,” said Anna’s Archive, which describes its mission as “safeguarding humanity’s knowledge and heritage”.
Model Development and Copyright Debate
Ed Newton-Rex for protecting artists’ rights, said the breached music would probably be used for training AI models.
“Training on pirated material is unfortunately widespread in the tech sector, so this accessed music is highly likely to be used instructing AI models,” he said.
The group's website makes references to a large online archive, a huge online repository of copyrighted books that has allegedly been leveraged by the parent company of Facebook to develop its systems.
A founder of an AI startup posted on the professional network that members of the public could in principle “create their own private free equivalent of Spotify”. He said it could also enable technology firms to “educate models on modern music at scale”.
Copyright has emerged as a battleground between creatives, authors and creatives on one side and tech giants on the other.
Government Considerations and Responses
Across Britain, creative professionals have raised concerns against a government suggestion to let AI companies use copyright-protected work without consent unless the owner opts out. Almost every participant to a government consultation on the proposal has supported 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 “use the time to get this correct”. The government has pledged to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by next year.
