Advocacy Group Claims to Have Scraped Millions of Audio Files from the Streaming Giant
A digital rights group has claimed to have scraped a vast number of songs from the popular streaming service and is getting ready to publish them online.
Possible Boost for AI Development
Observers said the apparent data breach could aid artificial intelligence firms looking for data to develop their models.
A group known as Anna’s Archive said it had obtained 86 million audio tracks from Spotify and 256 million entries of associated data such as artist and album names. Spotify, which carries more than 100 million tracks, stated that the breach did not constitute its full catalog.
“We have identified and disabled the nefarious user accounts that engaged in illegal scraping,” stated a company spokesperson.
The Swedish company, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, further explained that an inquiry into unauthorised access identified a external actor scraped public metadata and employed questionable tactics to bypass DRM protections.
Archive's Stated Goal and Concerns
Spotify does not believe the music taken by Anna’s Archive has been released yet. Anna’s Archive, which is recognized for offering links to copyright-infringing books, said 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 exchanging large data files online.
“Naturally the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a great beginning,” said Anna’s Archive, which describes its mission as “preserving humanity’s knowledge and culture”.
Model Development and Copyright Debate
Ed Newton-Rex for protecting artists’ copyright, remarked the leaked music would probably be utilized for training artificial intelligence systems.
“Training on pirated material is unfortunately widespread in the tech sector, so this accessed music is highly likely to be used instructing AI models,” he said.
The group's website alludes to a large online archive, a vast online repository of pirated books that has allegedly been used by the parent company of Facebook to develop its systems.
A founder of an AI startup posted on LinkedIn that individuals of the public could in principle “build their own private free version of the service”. He said it could also enable technology firms to “train on modern music at a large volume”.
Intellectual property law has emerged as a key issue between creatives, authors and content creators on one side and tech giants on the other.
Government Considerations and Reactions
In the UK, artists and writers have protested against a ministerial proposal to let AI companies use protected work without permission unless the rights holder signals. Virtually every respondent to a government consultation on the proposal has backed artists’ concerns.
The secretary of state for science, research and technology informed parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the matter, noting that ministers would “take the time to get this correct”. The government has pledged to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by next year.
