Activist Group Claims to Have Extracted Countless of Audio Tracks from the Streaming Giant
An activist organization has claimed to have scraped a vast number of tracks from Spotify and is getting ready to release them publicly.
Potential Impetus for Artificial Intelligence Training
Industry experts noted the apparent leak could aid artificial intelligence firms searching for material to train their technology.
An entity called Anna’s Archive reported it had obtained 86 million music files from Spotify and 256 million rows of metadata such as artist and record names. Spotify, which hosts more than 100 million songs, confirmed that the leak did not constitute its entire inventory.
“We have located and deactivated the malicious user accounts that engaged in unlawful scraping,” said a company spokesperson.
The Stockholm-based company, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, added that an investigation into unauthorized access identified a external actor collected public metadata and employed questionable methods to circumvent DRM [digital rights management].
Archive's Declared Goal and Concerns
Spotify does not believe the music acquired by Anna’s Archive has been released yet. Anna’s Archive, which is known for providing links to pirated books, wrote in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.
They claimed the audio files accounted for 99.6% of all music listened to by Spotify users and would be distributed via ‘torrents’, a method of sharing large digital 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 purpose as “safeguarding humanity’s knowledge and culture”.
Model Development and Copyright Battleground
Ed Newton-Rex for protecting artists’ rights, said the leaked music would likely be used for developing AI models.
“Training on illegally sourced material is sadly common in the tech sector, so this accessed music is highly likely to end up training AI models,” he stated.
The group's website makes references to LibGen, a huge online repository of pirated books that has reportedly been leveraged by Meta to develop its AI models.
A founder of an artificial intelligence company posted on the professional network that individuals of the public could in theory “build their own personal free equivalent of the service”. He added it could also enable tech companies to “train on modern music at scale”.
Intellectual property law has become a battleground between artists, authors and content creators on one side and tech giants on the other.
Government Proposals and Responses
In the UK, creative professionals have raised concerns against a ministerial proposal to let AI companies use protected work without consent unless the owner opts out. Virtually every respondent to a government consultation on the proposal has backed artists’ apprehensions.
The secretary of state for science, research and technology informed parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the matter, noting that ministers would “use the time to get this correct”. The administration has committed to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by March 2025.
