A digital rights organization has stated to have harvested millions of songs from Spotify and is preparing to release them online.
Possible Boost for AI Development
Observers said the seeming data breach could boost AI companies looking for material to develop their models.
An entity known as Anna’s Archive reported it had obtained 86 million music files from the platform and 256 million entries of associated data such as performer and album names. Spotify, which carries more than 100 million tracks, confirmed that the leak did not constitute its entire catalog.
“We have identified and disabled the malicious user accounts that were involved in unlawful scraping,” stated a Spotify spokesperson.
The Swedish company, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, further explained that an inquiry into unauthorized access found a external actor scraped public metadata and used questionable tactics to bypass DRM protections.
Archive's Declared Mission and Concerns
Spotify does not think the music taken by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is known for providing links to copyright-infringing books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘historical repository’ for music.
They asserted the audio files accounted for 99.6% of all music listened to by its listeners and would be shared via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, a means of sharing large digital files online.
“Of course Spotify doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a great beginning,” commented Anna’s Archive, which frames its mission as “safeguarding humanity’s knowledge and culture”.
Model Development and Copyright Battleground
Ed Newton-Rex for protecting artists’ rights, remarked the breached music would probably be used for developing AI models.
“Training on pirated data is unfortunately common in the AI industry, so this stolen music is highly likely to be used training AI models,” he stated.
The Anna’s Archive site makes references to LibGen, a vast online repository of pirated books that has allegedly been leveraged by the parent company of Facebook to train its AI models.
A founder of an AI startup posted on the professional network that individuals of the public could in theory “build their own private free equivalent of Spotify”. He added it could also allow tech companies to “educate models on modern music at scale”.
Copyright has emerged as a battleground between creatives, writers and content creators on one side and AI companies on the other.
Government Proposals and Reactions
In the UK, creative professionals have protested against a government suggestion to allow AI companies use protected work without permission unless the rights holder opts out. Almost every participant to a government call for evidence on the idea has backed artists’ apprehensions.
A government minister for science, research and development told parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the issue, noting that ministers would “take the time to get this right”. The government has committed to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by next year.
