Activist Collective Asserts to Have Scraped Millions of Audio Files from Spotify
A digital rights group has claimed to have harvested millions of songs from the popular streaming service and is getting ready to release them publicly.
Possible Boost for Artificial Intelligence Development
Industry experts said the apparent data breach could boost artificial intelligence firms looking for data to develop their technology.
A group called Anna’s Archive reported it had scraped 86 million audio tracks from the platform and 256 million entries of metadata such as performer and record names. The company, which carries more than 100 million tracks, confirmed that the breach did not represent its entire inventory.
“We have located and deactivated the malicious user accounts that were involved in unlawful scraping,” stated a Spotify representative.
The Stockholm-based company, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, further explained that an inquiry into unauthorised access identified a third party scraped public metadata and used illicit methods to circumvent DRM protections.
Archive's Stated Goal and Concerns
The streaming service does not think the audio acquired by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is known for providing links to pirated 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 streamed to by Spotify users and would be distributed via ‘torrents’, a method of exchanging large data files online.
“Naturally Spotify doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a fantastic beginning,” commented Anna’s Archive, which describes its purpose as “preserving humanity’s knowledge and heritage”.
Model Development and Intellectual Property Debate
Ed Newton-Rex for protecting artists’ copyright, 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 accessed music is almost certain to end up instructing AI models,” he said.
The Anna’s Archive site alludes to LibGen, a vast online archive of pirated books that has allegedly been leveraged by Meta to develop its systems.
The co-founder of an AI startup wrote on the professional network that members of the public could in principle “build their own personal free equivalent of the service”. The executive said it could also allow technology firms to “train on contemporary music at scale”.
Copyright has become a battleground between artists, writers and creatives on one side and tech giants on the other.
Policy Considerations and Responses
Across Britain, artists and writers have raised concerns against a government proposal to let AI companies use protected work without permission unless the rights holder signals. Virtually every participant to a government call for evidence on the proposal has supported artists’ apprehensions.
The secretary of state for technology, research and technology informed parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the matter, noting that ministers would “take the time to get this right”. The administration has pledged to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by next year.
