An activist organization has stated to have scraped a vast number of songs from Spotify and is preparing to release them publicly.
Potential Impetus for Artificial Intelligence Training
Observers said the seeming leak could aid artificial intelligence firms looking for data to develop their models.
A group known as Anna’s Archive said it had obtained 86 million audio tracks from the platform and 256 million entries of metadata such as performer and album names. The company, which carries more than 100 million tracks, stated that the leak did not represent its full catalog.
“We have located and disabled the malicious user accounts that were involved in unlawful scraping,” stated a company spokesperson.
The Swedish company, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, further explained that an investigation into unauthorized access found a external actor collected public metadata and used questionable tactics to bypass DRM protections.
Group's Stated Mission and Worries
The streaming service does not believe 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 ‘preservation archive’ for music.
They asserted the music files represented 99.6% of all music streamed to by its listeners and would be shared via ‘torrents’, a method of sharing 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 frames its mission as “safeguarding humanity’s knowledge and heritage”.
AI Training and Intellectual Property Debate
A composer and campaigner for protecting artists’ rights, remarked the breached music would likely be used for developing artificial intelligence systems.
“Educating models on pirated 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 LibGen, a vast online repository of copyrighted books that has allegedly been used by the parent company of Facebook to train its AI models.
A founder of an AI startup posted on LinkedIn that members of the public could in principle “build their own personal free version of Spotify”. The executive added it could also enable tech companies to “educate models on modern music at a large volume”.
Copyright has become a key issue between creatives, authors and content creators on one side and AI companies on the other.
Government Proposals and Reactions
In the UK, artists and writers have protested against a government proposal to let AI companies use copyright-protected work without consent unless the rights holder opts out. Virtually every respondent to a government call for evidence on the proposal has supported artists’ apprehensions.
A government minister for science, innovation and technology told parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the matter, noting that ministers would “take the time to get this right”. The government has pledged to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by next year.
