A digital rights group has stated to have harvested millions of tracks from the popular streaming service and is preparing to publish them publicly.
Potential Boost for AI Training
Industry experts said the apparent data breach could aid AI companies looking for material to train their technology.
A group known as Anna’s Archive reported it had obtained 86 million audio tracks from Spotify and 256 million rows of associated data such as performer and album names. Spotify, which hosts more than 100 million songs, stated that the breach did not constitute its entire inventory.
“We have identified and deactivated the malicious user accounts that engaged in unlawful scraping,” stated a Spotify representative.
The Stockholm-based company, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, added that an investigation into unauthorised access found a external actor scraped public metadata and used illicit methods to bypass DRM [digital rights management].
Archive's Declared Goal and Worries
The streaming service does not think the audio acquired by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is recognized for offering links to copyright-infringing books, wrote in a blog it wanted to create a ‘historical repository’ for music.
The group claimed the music files accounted for 99.6% of all music listened to by its listeners and would be shared via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, a method of exchanging large data files online.
“Of course the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a great beginning,” said Anna’s Archive, which frames its purpose as “preserving humanity’s knowledge and culture”.
AI Training and Copyright Battleground
Ed Newton-Rex for protecting artists’ copyright, remarked the leaked music would likely be utilized for developing AI models.
“Training on pirated data is unfortunately common in the AI industry, so this stolen music is highly likely to end up instructing AI models,” he said.
The Anna’s Archive site alludes to a large online archive, a huge online repository of copyrighted books that has allegedly been used by Meta to train its AI models.
The co-founder of an artificial intelligence company wrote on the professional network that individuals of the public could in principle “create their own private free version of Spotify”. The executive added it could also allow tech companies to “educate models on contemporary music at scale”.
Intellectual property law has become a battleground between creatives, authors and creatives on one side and AI companies on the other.
Policy Considerations and Reactions
In the UK, artists and writers have raised concerns against a government proposal to allow AI companies utilize copyright-protected work without permission unless the owner signals. Almost every participant to a government call for evidence on the proposal has supported artists’ concerns.
A government minister for science, innovation and development told parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the matter, noting that ministers would “use the time to get this correct”. The government has pledged to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by next year.
