A digital rights group has claimed to have scraped millions of tracks from the popular streaming service and is preparing to publish them publicly.
Possible Impetus for Artificial Intelligence Training
Industry experts said the apparent leak could aid AI companies searching for data to develop their models.
An entity called Anna’s Archive reported it had scraped 86 million music files from the platform and 256 million rows of metadata such as artist and album names. The company, which hosts more than 100 million tracks, confirmed that the breach did not constitute its full inventory.
“We have located and deactivated the nefarious user accounts that engaged in illegal scraping,” stated a Spotify representative.
The Swedish service, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, added that an investigation into unauthorised access identified a external actor scraped public metadata and used questionable methods to circumvent DRM [digital rights management].
Group's Declared 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 known for offering links to copyright-infringing books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.
The group asserted the music files represented 99.6% of all music streamed to by its listeners and would be distributed via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, a method of exchanging large digital files online.
“Naturally Spotify doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a fantastic beginning,” said Anna’s Archive, which frames its purpose as “safeguarding humanity’s information and culture”.
AI Training and Intellectual Property Debate
Ed Newton-Rex for protecting artists’ rights, remarked the leaked music would likely be used for developing artificial intelligence systems.
“Educating models on illegally sourced data is unfortunately common in the tech sector, so this stolen music is almost certain to end up training AI models,” he said.
The group's website makes references to a large online archive, a vast online repository of copyrighted books that has reportedly been leveraged by the parent company of Facebook to develop its systems.
A founder of an artificial intelligence company wrote on the professional network that individuals of the public could in principle “build their own personal free equivalent of Spotify”. The executive said it could also enable tech companies to “train on contemporary music at a large volume”.
Intellectual property law has emerged as a key issue between artists, writers and content creators on one side and AI companies on the other.
Government Proposals and Responses
Across Britain, creative professionals have raised concerns against a ministerial suggestion to let AI companies use copyright-protected work without consent unless the rights holder opts out. Virtually every participant to a government call for evidence on the idea has backed artists’ concerns.
The secretary of state for science, research and development informed parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the matter, adding that ministers would “take the time to get this right”. The administration has committed to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by next year.
