A digital rights organization has stated to have scraped a vast number of tracks from Spotify and is getting ready to publish them online.
Potential Boost for Artificial Intelligence Development
Industry experts noted the seeming leak could aid artificial intelligence firms looking for material to train their models.
An entity called Anna’s Archive said it had obtained 86 million music files from Spotify and 256 million entries of associated data such as artist and record names. The company, which hosts more than 100 million tracks, stated that the leak did not constitute its full inventory.
“We have located and deactivated the nefarious user accounts that engaged in illegal scraping,” said a Spotify spokesperson.
The Stockholm-based service, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, added that an investigation into unauthorized access found a third party collected public metadata and used questionable tactics to circumvent DRM protections.
Archive's Stated Mission and Concerns
Spotify does not think the music taken by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is recognized for providing links to pirated books, wrote in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.
They claimed the music files represented 99.6% of all music listened to by Spotify users and would be distributed via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, a method of exchanging large digital 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 frames its mission as “safeguarding humanity’s knowledge and heritage”.
AI Training and Intellectual Property Debate
A composer and campaigner for defending artists’ rights, remarked the breached music would probably be used for developing AI models.
“Educating models on illegally sourced data is sadly common in the AI industry, so this accessed music is almost certain to end up instructing AI models,” he stated.
The Anna’s Archive site alludes to a large online archive, a huge online archive of pirated books that has reportedly been leveraged by the parent company of Facebook to train its AI models.
The co-founder of an AI startup posted on LinkedIn that individuals of the public could in theory “build their own personal free equivalent of the service”. He said it could also enable technology firms to “train on modern music at scale”.
Copyright has emerged as a battleground between creatives, authors and creatives on one side and tech giants on the other.
Policy Considerations and Responses
Across Britain, artists and writers have protested against a government suggestion to let AI companies use copyright-protected work without consent unless the rights holder opts out. Almost every participant to a government call for evidence on the proposal has supported artists’ apprehensions.
A government minister for technology, research and technology informed parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the issue, noting that ministers would “take the time to get this correct”. The administration has pledged to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by next year.
