An activist group has stated to have harvested millions of tracks from the popular streaming service and is getting ready to publish them publicly.
Potential Impetus for AI Development
Observers noted the seeming leak could aid AI companies searching for data to develop their models.
A group known as Anna’s Archive reported it had obtained 86 million music files 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 breach did not represent its entire catalog.
“We have identified and deactivated the malicious user accounts that were involved in illegal scraping,” said a Spotify spokesperson.
The Stockholm-based service, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, further explained that an inquiry into unauthorised access identified a third party collected public metadata and employed questionable methods to bypass DRM [digital rights management].
Archive's Declared Goal and Worries
Spotify does not think the audio taken by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is recognized for offering links to pirated books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.
They asserted the music files represented 99.6% of all music listened to by Spotify users and would be shared via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, a method of sharing large digital files online.
“Naturally Spotify doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a great start,” commented Anna’s Archive, which describes its purpose as “preserving humanity’s information and heritage”.
Model Development and Intellectual Property Battleground
A composer and campaigner for defending artists’ copyright, remarked the leaked music would probably be used for training artificial intelligence systems.
“Educating models on pirated material is sadly widespread in the AI industry, so this accessed music is almost certain to be used training AI models,” he said.
The group's website makes references to a large online archive, a huge online archive of copyrighted books that has allegedly been used by Meta to develop its AI models.
A founder of an AI startup wrote on the professional network that individuals of the public could in principle “create their own private free version of Spotify”. He said it could also enable tech companies to “educate models on contemporary music at scale”.
Copyright has become a key issue between creatives, writers and creatives on one side and AI companies on the other.
Government Considerations and Reactions
In the UK, creative professionals have raised concerns against a government proposal to allow AI companies utilize copyright-protected work without permission unless the owner opts out. Virtually every participant to a government consultation on the proposal has backed artists’ concerns.
A government minister for science, research and technology informed parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the matter, noting that ministers would “take the time to get this correct”. The administration has committed to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by next year.
