An activist group has stated to have scraped millions of songs from Spotify and is preparing to release them online.
Possible Impetus for Artificial Intelligence Training
Industry experts said the seeming leak could aid artificial intelligence firms looking for material to train their models.
A group known as Anna’s Archive reported it had obtained 86 million audio tracks from Spotify and 256 million rows of associated data such as artist and record names. Spotify, which carries more than 100 million songs, stated that the breach did not constitute its full inventory.
“We have located and disabled the nefarious user accounts that engaged in illegal scraping,” stated a Spotify representative.
The Stockholm-based service, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, further explained that an inquiry into unauthorized access found a third party scraped public metadata and used questionable methods to bypass DRM protections.
Archive's Stated Goal and Worries
The streaming service does not think 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, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘historical repository’ for music.
The group claimed the audio files accounted for 99.6% of all music streamed to by its listeners and would be distributed via ‘torrents’, a means of sharing large data files online.
“Naturally Spotify doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a great start,” said Anna’s Archive, which frames its purpose as “preserving humanity’s knowledge and heritage”.
AI Training and Intellectual Property Debate
Ed Newton-Rex for defending artists’ copyright, said the leaked music would likely be utilized for developing artificial intelligence systems.
“Training on pirated material is unfortunately common in the tech sector, so this stolen music is highly likely to end up instructing AI models,” he stated.
The Anna’s Archive site makes references to LibGen, a huge online archive of copyrighted books that has allegedly been leveraged by the parent company of Facebook to develop its AI models.
A founder of an artificial intelligence company posted on LinkedIn that members of the public could in principle “build their own private free version of Spotify”. The executive added it could also allow tech companies to “educate models on contemporary music at scale”.
Intellectual property law has emerged as a battleground between artists, writers and content creators on one side and tech giants on the other.
Government Proposals and Responses
Across Britain, artists and writers have protested against a ministerial suggestion to allow AI companies use protected work without consent unless the rights holder signals. Almost every participant to a government call for evidence on the idea has supported artists’ apprehensions.
The secretary of state for science, research and development informed parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the matter, noting that ministers would “take the time to get this correct”. The administration has pledged to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by next year.
