An activist group has claimed to have harvested millions of tracks from Spotify and is preparing to publish them online.
Potential Boost for Artificial Intelligence Training
Industry experts said the apparent leak could aid artificial intelligence firms looking for material to train their technology.
A group called Anna’s Archive reported it had scraped 86 million music files from Spotify and 256 million entries of associated data such as performer and record names. The company, which hosts more than 100 million songs, stated that the leak did not represent its entire catalog.
“We have identified and deactivated the malicious user accounts that engaged in illegal scraping,” said a company spokesperson.
The Swedish service, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, added that an inquiry into unauthorized access identified a external actor scraped public metadata and employed questionable methods to bypass DRM protections.
Group's Stated Goal and Worries
Spotify does not think the music acquired by Anna’s Archive has been released yet. Anna’s Archive, which is recognized for offering links to copyright-infringing books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.
They claimed the audio files accounted for 99.6% of all music listened to by Spotify users and would be shared via ‘torrents’, a method of sharing large data files online.
“Of course the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a fantastic beginning,” commented Anna’s Archive, which frames its purpose as “preserving humanity’s knowledge and culture”.
Model Development and Intellectual Property Debate
Ed Newton-Rex for protecting artists’ rights, said the breached music would probably be used for developing artificial intelligence systems.
“Educating models on pirated material is unfortunately common in the AI industry, so this stolen music is highly likely to end up instructing AI models,” he stated.
The group's website makes references to a large online archive, a huge online repository of copyrighted books that has reportedly been used by the parent company of Facebook to develop its systems.
The co-founder of an AI startup wrote on the professional network that individuals of the public could in principle “create their own personal free version of the service”. The executive added it could also enable tech companies to “train on contemporary music at scale”.
Intellectual property law has emerged as a battleground between artists, writers and creatives on one side and tech giants on the other.
Government Proposals and Responses
In the UK, creative professionals have protested against a government suggestion to let AI companies use copyright-protected work without permission unless the rights holder opts out. Virtually every participant to a government call for evidence on the idea has supported artists’ apprehensions.
The secretary of state for technology, innovation and development informed parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the issue, noting that ministers would “use the time to get this right”. The administration has pledged to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by next year.
