A digital rights organization has stated to have scraped millions of songs from Spotify and is getting ready to publish them publicly.
Possible Impetus for Artificial Intelligence Training
Observers noted the apparent leak could aid AI companies searching for material to train their models.
An entity known as Anna’s Archive said it had scraped 86 million audio tracks from Spotify and 256 million rows of associated data such as performer and album names. The company, which hosts more than 100 million tracks, stated that the leak did not represent its entire inventory.
“We have located and deactivated the nefarious user accounts that engaged in unlawful scraping,” stated a company spokesperson.
The Swedish company, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, added that an investigation into unauthorised access identified a external actor collected public metadata and used illicit tactics to circumvent DRM protections.
Group's Stated Goal and Worries
The streaming service does not think the music acquired by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is known for offering links to pirated 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 distributed via ‘torrents’, a means of exchanging large data files online.
“Of course the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a fantastic beginning,” commented Anna’s Archive, which describes its mission as “preserving humanity’s information and culture”.
Model Development and Intellectual Property Battleground
A composer and campaigner for defending artists’ copyright, remarked the breached music would probably be utilized for developing AI models.
“Training on illegally sourced data is sadly widespread in the AI industry, so this stolen music is highly likely to be used 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 allegedly been used by the parent company of Facebook to develop its AI models.
The co-founder of an AI startup wrote on the professional network that members of the public could in principle “build their own personal free equivalent of Spotify”. He said it could also enable tech companies to “train on modern music at a large volume”.
Copyright has emerged as a key issue between creatives, authors and content creators on one side and tech giants on the other.
Government Considerations and Responses
Across Britain, creative professionals have raised concerns against a government proposal to let AI companies use protected work without permission unless the owner opts out. Virtually every participant to a government consultation on the idea has supported artists’ apprehensions.
The secretary of state for technology, research and development told parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the issue, noting that ministers would “use the time to get this correct”. The government has committed to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by next year.
