An activist organization has claimed to have scraped a vast number of songs from Spotify and is preparing to publish them publicly.
Possible Impetus for Artificial Intelligence Training
Industry experts said the seeming leak could boost AI companies looking for data to train their models.
A group known as Anna’s Archive said it had obtained 86 million music files from the platform and 256 million entries of associated data such as artist and album names. Spotify, which hosts more than 100 million tracks, confirmed that the leak did not represent its full catalog.
“We have identified and deactivated the malicious user accounts that engaged in illegal scraping,” stated a company spokesperson.
The Swedish company, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, further explained that an investigation into unauthorised access identified a external actor collected public metadata and employed questionable methods to circumvent DRM protections.
Group's Stated Mission and Worries
Spotify does not think the audio acquired by Anna’s Archive has been made public 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.
They claimed the music 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.
“Of course Spotify doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a fantastic start,” commented Anna’s Archive, which describes its purpose as “preserving humanity’s information and culture”.
Model Development and Intellectual Property Debate
A composer and campaigner for protecting artists’ copyright, remarked the breached music would likely be used for training artificial intelligence systems.
“Educating models on pirated material is sadly widespread in the AI industry, so this stolen music is almost certain to be used instructing AI models,” he said.
The Anna’s Archive site makes references to LibGen, a huge online repository of copyrighted books that has reportedly been leveraged by Meta to develop its AI models.
A founder of an AI startup wrote on the professional network that members of the public could in principle “create their own personal free version of Spotify”. He said it could also enable technology firms to “train on contemporary music at a large volume”.
Intellectual property law has emerged as a battleground between artists, writers and content creators on one side and AI companies on the other.
Government Considerations and Reactions
In the UK, artists and writers have protested against a ministerial proposal to allow AI companies use copyright-protected work without consent unless the rights holder opts out. Almost every participant to a government call for evidence on the idea has backed artists’ concerns.
The secretary of state for science, innovation and technology told parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the issue, adding that ministers would “take the time to get this right”. The administration has committed to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by March 2025.
