An activist group has stated to have scraped a vast number of tracks from the popular streaming service and is getting ready to release them online.
Potential Impetus for AI Development
Observers said the apparent data breach could aid AI companies searching for data to develop their models.
A group known as Anna’s Archive reported it had scraped 86 million music files from the platform and 256 million entries of metadata such as artist and record names. Spotify, which hosts more than 100 million songs, confirmed that the breach did not constitute its full inventory.
“We have located and disabled the nefarious user accounts that were involved in unlawful scraping,” stated a company spokesperson.
The Stockholm-based company, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, added that an investigation into unauthorised access found a external actor collected public metadata and employed questionable tactics to bypass DRM [digital rights management].
Archive's Stated Mission and Concerns
The streaming service does not believe the audio 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.
The group claimed the audio files represented 99.6% of all music streamed to by Spotify users and would be distributed via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, a method of exchanging large data files online.
“Of course the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a great beginning,” said Anna’s Archive, which describes its purpose as “preserving humanity’s knowledge and culture”.
Model Development and Intellectual Property Debate
Ed Newton-Rex for defending artists’ copyright, remarked the leaked music would likely be utilized for training artificial intelligence systems.
“Training on illegally sourced material is unfortunately widespread in the AI industry, so this stolen music is almost certain to be used training AI models,” he stated.
The group's website alludes to a large online archive, a vast online archive of pirated books that has reportedly been used by the parent company of Facebook to develop its systems.
A founder of an artificial intelligence company wrote on LinkedIn that members of the public could in principle “create their own personal free equivalent of the service”. He added it could also enable technology firms to “train on contemporary music at scale”.
Intellectual property law has emerged as a key issue between creatives, authors and creatives on one side and AI companies on the other.
Government Proposals and Reactions
In the UK, artists and writers have protested against a government suggestion to allow AI companies use copyright-protected work without permission unless the rights holder opts out. Almost every participant to a government consultation on the proposal has backed artists’ apprehensions.
A government minister for technology, innovation and development informed parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the matter, adding that ministers would “use the time to get this right”. The government has pledged to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by next year.
