Advocacy Group Claims to Have Scraped Countless of Music Files from the Streaming Giant
An activist organization has stated to have harvested millions of tracks from Spotify and is getting ready to release them online.
Potential Boost for AI Development
Observers said the seeming data breach could aid AI companies looking for data to develop their technology.
A group known as Anna’s Archive reported it had obtained 86 million music files from the platform and 256 million rows of associated data such as artist and record names. The company, which carries more than 100 million tracks, stated that the breach did not constitute its full catalog.
“We have identified and disabled the malicious user accounts that were involved in illegal scraping,” said a company representative.
The Swedish service, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, further explained that an investigation into unauthorised access found a external actor scraped public metadata and employed illicit tactics to bypass DRM [digital rights management].
Archive's Declared Goal and Worries
The streaming service does not think the audio taken by Anna’s Archive has been released yet. Anna’s Archive, which is known for providing links to pirated books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘historical repository’ for music.
The group claimed the music files accounted for 99.6% of all music streamed to by its listeners and would be distributed via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, a method of sharing large data files online.
“Of course the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a fantastic beginning,” said Anna’s Archive, which frames its mission as “preserving humanity’s knowledge and culture”.
AI Training and Copyright Debate
A composer and campaigner for defending artists’ rights, said the leaked music would likely be utilized for developing AI models.
“Educating models on pirated data is sadly common in the tech sector, so this accessed music is almost certain to be used training AI models,” he stated.
The Anna’s Archive site alludes to a large online archive, a huge online archive of copyrighted books that has reportedly been used by Meta to develop its systems.
A founder of an AI startup wrote on the professional network that members of the public could in theory “create their own private free equivalent of Spotify”. He added it could also enable technology firms to “train on modern music at scale”.
Copyright has emerged as a battleground between artists, authors and content creators on one side and tech giants on the other.
Government Considerations and Responses
In the UK, creative professionals have raised concerns against a ministerial suggestion to allow AI companies use copyright-protected work without consent unless the rights holder opts out. Almost every respondent to a government consultation on the idea has backed artists’ concerns.
The secretary of state for science, innovation and development informed parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the matter, adding that ministers would “take the time to get this correct”. The government has pledged to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by March 2025.
