An activist organization has stated to have scraped millions of songs from Spotify and is getting ready to release them publicly.
Potential Boost for Artificial Intelligence Development
Observers noted the apparent data breach could boost artificial intelligence firms searching for material to develop their technology.
An entity known as Anna’s Archive said it had obtained 86 million audio tracks from the platform and 256 million entries of metadata such as artist and record names. Spotify, which carries more than 100 million tracks, stated that the breach did not constitute its entire inventory.
“We have located and disabled the nefarious user accounts that engaged in illegal scraping,” stated a Spotify spokesperson.
The Swedish service, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, added that an inquiry into unauthorised access found a third party scraped public metadata and employed illicit tactics to circumvent DRM [digital rights management].
Archive's Declared Goal and Worries
The streaming service does not believe the audio taken by Anna’s Archive has been released 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 asserted the music files represented 99.6% of all music streamed to by Spotify users and would be distributed via ‘torrents’, a method of sharing large digital files online.
“Naturally Spotify doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a fantastic start,” said Anna’s Archive, which describes its mission as “safeguarding humanity’s information and culture”.
Model Development and Intellectual Property Battleground
Ed Newton-Rex for protecting artists’ copyright, said the breached music would likely be utilized for training AI models.
“Educating models on pirated data is sadly widespread in the AI industry, so this stolen music is almost certain to end up instructing AI models,” he said.
The Anna’s Archive site makes references to LibGen, a vast online repository of pirated books that has reportedly been leveraged by the parent company of Facebook to develop its AI models.
A founder of an artificial intelligence company posted on the professional network that members of the public could in theory “build their own private free equivalent of Spotify”. The executive added it could also enable technology firms to “train on modern music at a large volume”.
Intellectual property law has become a key issue between creatives, authors and content creators on one side and AI companies on the other.
Policy Considerations and Responses
In the UK, artists and writers have raised concerns against a ministerial proposal to allow AI companies utilize copyright-protected work without consent unless the rights holder signals. Virtually every participant to a government consultation on the proposal has backed 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 right”. The administration has pledged to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by next year.
