An activist group has stated to have harvested a vast number of songs from Spotify and is getting ready to release them publicly.
Possible Impetus for Artificial Intelligence Development
Observers noted the seeming leak could aid AI companies looking for data to develop their models.
An entity called Anna’s Archive said it had obtained 86 million audio tracks from the platform and 256 million rows of associated data such as artist and record names. Spotify, which hosts more than 100 million tracks, stated that the leak did not constitute its entire inventory.
“We have identified and deactivated the nefarious user accounts that were involved in illegal scraping,” said a Spotify representative.
The Stockholm-based service, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, added that an inquiry into unauthorised access found a third party collected public metadata and used questionable methods to bypass DRM [digital rights management].
Archive's Declared Goal and Concerns
Spotify does not believe the audio taken by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is known for offering links to copyright-infringing books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘historical repository’ for music.
The group asserted the audio files represented 99.6% of all music listened to by Spotify users and would be distributed 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 mission as “preserving humanity’s information and heritage”.
Model Development and Copyright Battleground
A composer and campaigner for defending artists’ rights, remarked the leaked music would likely be used for developing AI models.
“Educating models on pirated data is sadly widespread in the AI industry, so this stolen music is almost certain to end up training AI models,” he said.
The Anna’s Archive site alludes to a large online archive, a vast online archive of copyrighted books that has allegedly been leveraged by Meta to train its systems.
The co-founder of an AI startup posted on LinkedIn that members of the public could in theory “create their own private free version of Spotify”. The executive said it could also allow technology firms to “educate models on contemporary music at scale”.
Copyright has become a battleground between creatives, authors and creatives on one side and AI companies on the other.
Government Considerations and Reactions
In the UK, artists and writers have raised concerns against a government suggestion to let AI companies use copyright-protected work without consent unless the rights holder signals. Virtually every respondent to a government consultation on the proposal has supported artists’ apprehensions.
A government minister for science, innovation and development told parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the matter, adding that ministers would “use the time to get this correct”. The government has committed to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by March 2025.
