A digital rights group has stated to have harvested a vast number of songs from the popular streaming service and is getting ready to release them online.
Potential Impetus for Artificial Intelligence Development
Observers said the seeming leak could aid artificial intelligence firms looking for data to develop their technology.
An entity called Anna’s Archive reported it had scraped 86 million audio tracks from Spotify and 256 million rows of associated data such as performer and record names. The company, which hosts more than 100 million songs, stated that the leak did not represent its full inventory.
“We have identified and deactivated the nefarious user accounts that engaged in illegal scraping,” said a Spotify spokesperson.
The Stockholm-based company, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, added that an inquiry into unauthorised access found a external actor collected public metadata and used illicit methods to circumvent DRM [digital rights management].
Group's Declared Mission and Worries
Spotify does not think the music acquired by Anna’s Archive has been released yet. Anna’s Archive, which is recognized for providing links to pirated books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.
The group claimed the audio files represented 99.6% of all music listened to by Spotify users and would be distributed via ‘torrents’, a method of sharing large digital files online.
“Of course the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a great beginning,” commented Anna’s Archive, which frames its purpose as “preserving humanity’s information and heritage”.
AI Training and Copyright Battleground
Ed Newton-Rex for defending artists’ rights, remarked the leaked music would likely be used for training artificial intelligence systems.
“Educating models on pirated data is sadly widespread in the tech sector, so this stolen music is almost certain to end up instructing AI models,” he said.
The Anna’s Archive site alludes to a large online archive, a vast online repository of copyrighted books that has reportedly been leveraged by the parent company of Facebook to train its systems.
The co-founder of an AI startup posted on the professional network that individuals of the public could in theory “create their own personal free version of the service”. The executive added it could also allow tech companies to “train on modern music at scale”.
Intellectual property law has emerged as a key issue between artists, writers and creatives on one side and tech giants on the other.
Government Proposals and Responses
Across Britain, artists and writers have raised concerns against a ministerial suggestion to allow AI companies utilize protected work without permission unless the owner opts out. Virtually every respondent to a government consultation on the idea has backed artists’ apprehensions.
A government minister for science, research and development told parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the issue, adding that ministers would “use the time to get this right”. The administration has committed to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by next year.
