A digital rights organization has claimed to have harvested millions of tracks from the popular streaming service and is preparing to release them publicly.
Possible Impetus for Artificial Intelligence Training
Industry experts said the seeming data breach could aid AI companies looking for material to train their technology.
A group known as Anna’s Archive reported it had scraped 86 million audio tracks from Spotify and 256 million rows of associated data such as artist and album names. Spotify, which hosts more than 100 million songs, confirmed that the breach did not represent its full catalog.
“We have located and disabled the nefarious user accounts that engaged in unlawful scraping,” stated a Spotify spokesperson.
The Stockholm-based service, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, further explained that an investigation into unauthorized access identified a third party scraped public metadata and employed questionable methods to circumvent DRM protections.
Group's Declared Mission and Worries
Spotify does not believe the audio acquired by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is known for offering links to copyright-infringing books, wrote in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.
The group asserted the music files represented 99.6% of all music listened to by its listeners and would be distributed via ‘torrents’, a means of sharing large data files online.
“Of course Spotify doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a great start,” said Anna’s Archive, which describes its mission as “safeguarding humanity’s information and heritage”.
Model Development and Copyright Debate
A composer and campaigner for protecting artists’ copyright, said the leaked music would probably be used for developing AI models.
“Training on pirated material is unfortunately widespread in the AI industry, so this accessed music is highly likely to be used instructing AI models,” he stated.
The group's website alludes to LibGen, a huge online archive of copyrighted books that has reportedly been used by Meta to develop its AI models.
The co-founder of an artificial intelligence company wrote on LinkedIn that members of the public could in principle “create their own private free version of the service”. He said it could also allow tech companies to “educate models 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
In the UK, creative professionals have protested against a government suggestion to let AI companies use copyright-protected work without consent unless the owner opts out. Virtually every participant to a government call for evidence on the idea has backed artists’ concerns.
A government minister for science, research and development told parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the issue, adding that ministers would “take the time to get this right”. The administration has pledged to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by March 2025.
