Advocacy Collective Asserts to Have Scraped Millions of Music Tracks from Spotify
An activist group has claimed to have scraped a vast number of tracks from Spotify and is preparing to publish them online.
Possible Boost for AI Development
Industry experts said the seeming leak could boost artificial intelligence firms looking for data to develop their models.
A group known as Anna’s Archive reported it had obtained 86 million music files from the platform and 256 million rows of metadata such as performer and album names. Spotify, which hosts more than 100 million tracks, confirmed that the breach did not constitute its entire inventory.
“We have located and disabled the nefarious user accounts that were involved in illegal scraping,” stated a Spotify representative.
The Stockholm-based company, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, further explained that an inquiry into unauthorised access found a third party scraped public metadata and used questionable tactics to bypass DRM [digital rights management].
Archive's Declared Mission and Worries
Spotify does not think 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.
They asserted the music files accounted for 99.6% of all music listened to by Spotify users and would be shared via ‘torrents’, a method of exchanging large digital files online.
“Of course Spotify doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a great beginning,” said Anna’s Archive, which describes its purpose as “safeguarding humanity’s information and heritage”.
Model Development and Intellectual Property Debate
Ed Newton-Rex for defending artists’ copyright, said the breached music would probably be utilized for developing AI models.
“Educating models on pirated data is sadly widespread in the AI industry, so this stolen music is highly likely to be used instructing AI models,” he said.
The group's website makes references to a large online archive, a vast online archive of copyrighted books that has allegedly been leveraged by the parent company of Facebook to develop its AI models.
A founder of an artificial intelligence company posted on LinkedIn that individuals of the public could in principle “build their own private free version of the service”. He added it could also allow tech companies to “train on contemporary music at a large volume”.
Intellectual property law has become a key issue between artists, writers and creatives on one side and tech giants on the other.
Government Proposals and Responses
In the UK, creative professionals have raised concerns against a government proposal to let AI companies utilize protected work without consent unless the owner opts out. Virtually every respondent to a government call for evidence on the idea has backed artists’ apprehensions.
The secretary of state for technology, innovation and technology told parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the issue, adding that ministers would “use the time to get this right”. The administration has pledged to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by March 2025.
