An activist organization has stated to have scraped a vast number of tracks from Spotify and is getting ready to publish them publicly.
Potential Impetus for Artificial Intelligence Development
Observers noted the seeming leak could aid AI companies searching for data 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 rows of metadata such as performer and album names. The company, which carries more than 100 million tracks, stated that the breach did not represent its full inventory.
“We have located and deactivated the nefarious user accounts that engaged in unlawful scraping,” said a company representative.
The Swedish company, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, added that an inquiry into unauthorized access identified a external actor collected public metadata and used illicit methods to circumvent DRM [digital rights management].
Archive's Stated Mission and Concerns
Spotify does not believe the audio taken by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is known for providing links to pirated books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.
They claimed the audio files represented 99.6% of all music listened to by its listeners and would be shared via ‘torrents’, a method of sharing large data files online.
“Naturally the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a fantastic beginning,” said Anna’s Archive, which describes its mission as “preserving humanity’s knowledge and heritage”.
AI Training and Intellectual Property Debate
Ed Newton-Rex for defending artists’ rights, remarked the leaked music would probably be used for developing artificial intelligence systems.
“Training on illegally sourced material is sadly widespread in the tech sector, so this accessed music is almost certain to end up training AI models,” he said.
The Anna’s Archive site alludes to LibGen, a huge online repository of copyrighted books that has allegedly been leveraged by the parent company of Facebook to train its AI models.
A founder of an AI startup posted on the professional network that members of the public could in principle “build their own personal free equivalent of Spotify”. The executive said it could also allow tech companies to “educate models on modern music at a large volume”.
Copyright has emerged as a battleground between artists, writers and creatives on one side and AI companies on the other.
Government Proposals and Responses
In the UK, artists and writers have protested against a government proposal to let AI companies utilize protected work without consent unless the owner opts out. Almost every participant to a government call for evidence on the proposal has backed artists’ concerns.
The secretary of state for technology, innovation and development informed parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the matter, adding that ministers would “use the time to get this right”. The government has committed to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by next year.
