A digital rights group has claimed to have harvested a vast number of tracks from the popular streaming service and is preparing to publish them online.
Potential Impetus for AI Development
Industry experts noted the apparent leak could aid AI companies searching for data to train their technology.
A group called Anna’s Archive reported it had obtained 86 million music files from Spotify and 256 million rows of associated data such as performer and album names. The company, which carries more than 100 million songs, confirmed that the leak did not constitute its entire catalog.
“We have located and disabled the malicious user accounts that engaged in illegal scraping,” said a company representative.
The Swedish company, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, added that an inquiry into unauthorized access found a third party scraped public metadata and used questionable tactics to bypass DRM [digital rights management].
Group's Stated Mission and Concerns
Spotify does not think the audio taken by Anna’s Archive has been released yet. Anna’s Archive, which is known for offering links to copyright-infringing books, wrote in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.
They claimed the music files accounted for 99.6% of all music listened to by Spotify users and would be shared via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, a method of sharing large data files online.
“Naturally 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 “preserving humanity’s information and culture”.
AI Training and Copyright Debate
A composer and campaigner for defending artists’ copyright, remarked the breached music would likely be used for developing AI models.
“Educating models on illegally sourced material is unfortunately widespread in the AI industry, so this stolen music is highly likely to end up training AI models,” he said.
The group's website makes references to a large online archive, a huge online archive of pirated books that has allegedly been leveraged by Meta to train its systems.
A founder of an AI startup wrote on LinkedIn that individuals of the public could in theory “create their own personal free version of the service”. He said it could also enable tech companies to “educate models on modern music at a large volume”.
Intellectual property law has emerged as a battleground between artists, authors and creatives on one side and tech giants on the other.
Policy Considerations and Reactions
Across Britain, creative professionals have protested against a ministerial suggestion to allow AI companies use copyright-protected work without permission unless the owner opts out. Virtually every participant to a government consultation on the idea has supported artists’ apprehensions.
A government minister for technology, research and technology told parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the issue, adding that ministers would “take the time to get this right”. The government has committed to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by March 2025.
