An activist organization has stated to have harvested a vast number of tracks from Spotify and is preparing to release them online.
Possible Boost for Artificial Intelligence Development
Industry experts noted the apparent leak could boost artificial intelligence firms searching for material to develop their technology.
An entity known as 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. Spotify, which carries more than 100 million songs, confirmed that the breach did not constitute its full inventory.
“We have located and deactivated the nefarious user accounts that engaged in unlawful scraping,” stated a Spotify spokesperson.
The Swedish service, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, further explained that an investigation into unauthorised access found a external actor collected public metadata and used illicit tactics to bypass DRM [digital rights management].
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 copyright-infringing books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘historical repository’ for music.
The group asserted the audio files accounted for 99.6% of all music listened to by Spotify users and would be distributed via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, a means of sharing large digital files online.
“Of course Spotify doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a great beginning,” commented Anna’s Archive, which describes its purpose as “safeguarding humanity’s knowledge and heritage”.
AI Training and Intellectual Property Debate
A composer and campaigner for protecting artists’ rights, remarked the breached music would probably be used for training artificial intelligence systems.
“Educating models on pirated data is unfortunately common in the tech sector, so this stolen music is almost certain to end up training AI models,” he stated.
The Anna’s Archive site makes references to a large online archive, a huge online repository of pirated books that has reportedly been used by the parent company of Facebook to develop its AI models.
A founder of an artificial intelligence company wrote on LinkedIn that members of the public could in principle “create their own personal free equivalent of the service”. He added it could also enable tech companies to “educate models on contemporary music at scale”.
Intellectual property law has become a key issue between creatives, writers and content creators on one side and tech giants on the other.
Policy Proposals and Responses
In the UK, artists and writers have protested against a government proposal to let AI companies use copyright-protected work without consent unless the rights holder opts out. Virtually every participant to a government call for evidence on the idea has backed artists’ concerns.
The secretary of state for science, innovation and development told parliament this month there was “no clear 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.
