A digital rights organization has claimed to have scraped millions of tracks from Spotify and is preparing to publish them online.
Potential Impetus for AI Development
Industry experts said the apparent leak could boost AI companies looking for material to train their models.
A group called Anna’s Archive reported it had obtained 86 million audio tracks from the platform and 256 million entries of associated data such as performer and record names. The company, which carries more than 100 million tracks, stated that the leak did not constitute its full catalog.
“We have located and deactivated the malicious user accounts that were involved in illegal scraping,” said a Spotify spokesperson.
The Swedish service, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, added that an investigation into unauthorized access identified a third party collected public metadata and employed illicit methods to bypass DRM protections.
Group's Declared Goal and Worries
Spotify does not think the music acquired by Anna’s Archive has been released yet. Anna’s Archive, which is recognized for providing links to copyright-infringing books, wrote in a blog it wanted to create a ‘historical repository’ for music.
The group asserted the audio files represented 99.6% of all music listened to by Spotify users and would be shared via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, a method of exchanging large digital files online.
“Naturally Spotify doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a great start,” commented Anna’s Archive, which describes its mission as “preserving humanity’s knowledge and culture”.
Model Development and Copyright Debate
Ed Newton-Rex for defending artists’ rights, said the leaked music would likely be utilized for training AI models.
“Educating models on illegally sourced data is unfortunately common in the AI industry, so this stolen music is highly likely to be used training AI models,” he said.
The Anna’s Archive site alludes to LibGen, a huge online archive of copyrighted books that has allegedly been leveraged by the parent company of Facebook to train its systems.
A founder of an AI startup posted on the professional network that members of the public could in theory “build their own private free version of Spotify”. The executive said it could also enable technology firms to “educate models on contemporary music at scale”.
Copyright has emerged as a key issue between artists, writers and content creators on one side and AI companies on the other.
Government Proposals and Reactions
In the UK, creative professionals have raised concerns against a ministerial suggestion to allow AI companies use copyright-protected work without consent unless the owner signals. Virtually every respondent to a government consultation on the proposal has supported artists’ apprehensions.
A government minister for science, research and technology informed parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the matter, adding that ministers would “use the time to get this right”. The administration has committed to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by March 2025.
