Activist Group Claims to Have Extracted Millions of Music Tracks from Spotify
An activist group has stated to have harvested millions of tracks from Spotify and is getting ready to publish them publicly.
Possible Boost for AI Training
Observers said the seeming leak could boost AI companies looking for material to develop their models.
An entity called Anna’s Archive said it had obtained 86 million audio tracks from Spotify and 256 million rows of associated data such as performer and record names. The company, which carries more than 100 million tracks, confirmed that the breach did not constitute its entire inventory.
“We have identified and disabled the malicious user accounts that engaged in unlawful scraping,” said a company spokesperson.
The Stockholm-based service, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, added that an investigation into unauthorised access found a third party collected public metadata and used illicit methods to circumvent DRM protections.
Archive's Stated Mission and Worries
Spotify does not think the music taken by Anna’s Archive has been released yet. Anna’s Archive, which is recognized for offering links to pirated books, wrote in a blog it wanted to create a ‘historical repository’ for music.
They claimed the music files accounted for 99.6% of all music listened to by its listeners and would be shared via ‘torrents’, a means of exchanging large digital 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 describes its mission as “safeguarding humanity’s information and culture”.
AI Training and Copyright Debate
Ed Newton-Rex for protecting artists’ copyright, remarked the breached music would probably be used for developing artificial intelligence systems.
“Educating models on illegally sourced data is unfortunately widespread in the AI industry, so this stolen music is highly likely to be used training AI models,” he stated.
The group's website makes references to a large online archive, a huge online repository of pirated books that has allegedly been used by the parent company of Facebook to develop its systems.
The co-founder of an AI startup wrote on the professional network that members of the public could in principle “build their own personal free version of Spotify”. He said it could also enable tech companies to “train on modern music at a large volume”.
Copyright has emerged as a key issue between creatives, writers and creatives on one side and AI companies on the other.
Government Considerations and Reactions
Across Britain, artists and writers have protested against a government proposal to allow AI companies utilize protected work without permission unless the owner signals. Almost every participant to a government consultation on the proposal has supported artists’ concerns.
The secretary of state for technology, innovation and development informed parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the issue, noting that ministers would “use the time to get this correct”. The administration has committed to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by March 2025.
