An activist group has stated to have harvested millions of songs from the popular streaming service and is preparing to release them online.
Potential Impetus for AI Development
Industry experts noted the seeming leak could aid artificial intelligence firms looking for material to train their technology.
A group known as Anna’s Archive reported it had obtained 86 million music files from Spotify and 256 million entries of associated data such as artist and album names. Spotify, which hosts more than 100 million songs, confirmed that the leak did not represent its entire inventory.
“We have identified and deactivated the malicious user accounts that were involved in illegal scraping,” stated a Spotify representative.
The Swedish service, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, further explained that an inquiry into unauthorised access found a external actor collected public metadata and used illicit methods to bypass DRM protections.
Group's Stated Mission and Concerns
The streaming service does not believe the audio acquired by Anna’s Archive has been released yet. Anna’s Archive, which is recognized for providing links to pirated books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘historical repository’ for music.
The group asserted the audio files represented 99.6% of all music listened to by its listeners and would be shared via ‘torrents’, a means of exchanging large data files online.
“Of course Spotify doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a fantastic beginning,” said Anna’s Archive, which frames its mission as “preserving humanity’s knowledge and heritage”.
Model Development and Copyright Battleground
Ed Newton-Rex for defending artists’ rights, said the breached music would probably be used for developing AI models.
“Training on illegally sourced data is sadly widespread in the AI industry, so this accessed music is highly likely to end up instructing AI models,” he stated.
The group's website alludes to LibGen, a huge online archive of copyrighted books that has allegedly been used by the parent company of Facebook to develop its AI models.
A founder of an artificial intelligence company wrote on LinkedIn that members of the public could in principle “build their own private free version of Spotify”. He said it could also enable tech companies to “train on contemporary music at scale”.
Copyright has emerged as a key issue between artists, authors and creatives on one side and tech giants on the other.
Government Considerations and Responses
Across Britain, artists and writers have protested against a government suggestion to let AI companies use protected work without consent unless the rights holder opts out. Virtually every participant to a government consultation on the idea has backed artists’ apprehensions.
A government minister for technology, innovation and technology informed parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the issue, adding that ministers would “take the time to get this correct”. The administration has pledged to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by next year.
