A digital rights organization has stated to have scraped a vast number of songs from Spotify and is preparing to publish them publicly.
Possible Impetus for Artificial Intelligence Training
Industry experts noted the seeming leak could boost AI companies searching for data to develop their models.
An entity called Anna’s Archive reported it had scraped 86 million music files from the platform and 256 million entries of metadata such as performer and album names. Spotify, which carries more than 100 million songs, stated that the leak did not constitute its full inventory.
“We have located and deactivated the nefarious user accounts that engaged in unlawful scraping,” said a Spotify spokesperson.
The Stockholm-based service, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, added that an inquiry into unauthorised access found a external actor scraped public metadata and used illicit methods to bypass DRM protections.
Archive's Stated Mission and Concerns
The streaming service does not think the audio acquired by Anna’s Archive has been released yet. Anna’s Archive, which is recognized 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 represented 99.6% of all music streamed to by its listeners and would be shared via ‘torrents’, a means of sharing 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 frames its purpose as “preserving humanity’s information and culture”.
AI Training and Copyright Battleground
A composer and campaigner for defending artists’ rights, remarked the leaked music would probably be used for developing artificial intelligence systems.
“Educating models on pirated material is unfortunately widespread in the tech sector, so this stolen music is almost certain to be used training AI models,” he said.
The Anna’s Archive site makes references to LibGen, a huge online archive of pirated books that has allegedly been leveraged by the parent company of Facebook to develop its systems.
A founder of an artificial intelligence company posted on LinkedIn that members of the public could in theory “build their own personal free equivalent of Spotify”. The executive said it could also allow tech companies to “train on modern music at scale”.
Copyright has emerged as a key issue between artists, authors and creatives on one side and AI companies on the other.
Policy Proposals and Responses
Across Britain, creative professionals have raised concerns against a ministerial proposal to allow AI companies utilize copyright-protected work without consent unless the owner opts out. Almost every respondent to a government call for evidence on the proposal has backed artists’ apprehensions.
The secretary of state for technology, research and development informed parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the issue, adding that ministers would “take the time to get this right”. The government has committed to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by next year.
