An activist group has claimed to have harvested a vast number of tracks from Spotify and is preparing to publish them online.
Possible Boost for Artificial Intelligence Development
Industry experts noted the apparent 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 audio tracks from Spotify and 256 million rows of metadata such as artist and record names. The company, which hosts more than 100 million songs, confirmed that the leak did not represent its entire inventory.
“We have located and disabled the malicious user accounts that engaged in illegal scraping,” said a company representative.
The Stockholm-based service, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, added that an investigation into unauthorized access found a external actor collected public metadata and used illicit tactics to circumvent DRM [digital rights management].
Group's Stated Mission and Concerns
The streaming service does not believe the music acquired by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is known for offering links to copyright-infringing 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 listened to by Spotify users and would be shared via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, a method of exchanging large digital files online.
“Naturally the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a fantastic start,” commented Anna’s Archive, which frames its mission as “safeguarding humanity’s knowledge and culture”.
AI Training and Intellectual Property Debate
Ed Newton-Rex for protecting artists’ rights, remarked the leaked music would likely be utilized for training artificial intelligence systems.
“Educating models on pirated data is unfortunately widespread in the tech sector, so this stolen music is highly likely to be used instructing AI models,” he stated.
The group's website alludes to LibGen, a vast online archive 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 posted on the professional network that members of the public could in theory “build their own private free equivalent of Spotify”. He added it could also enable technology firms to “educate models on contemporary music at scale”.
Copyright has emerged as a battleground between creatives, authors and content creators on one side and AI companies on the other.
Policy Considerations and Reactions
In the UK, artists and writers have raised concerns against a ministerial proposal to allow AI companies utilize copyright-protected work without consent unless the rights holder opts out. Virtually every respondent to a government consultation on the idea has backed artists’ apprehensions.
A government minister for technology, research and development told parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the matter, adding that ministers would “use the time to get this correct”. The administration has pledged to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by next year.
