🔗 Share this article

An activist organization has claimed to have scraped a vast number of songs from the popular streaming service and is getting ready to publish them publicly.

Possible Boost for AI Development

Industry experts noted the apparent leak could aid AI companies searching for material to develop their technology.

An entity known as Anna’s Archive reported it had scraped 86 million audio tracks from Spotify and 256 million entries of associated data such as performer and record names. The company, which carries more than 100 million tracks, stated that the breach did not represent its full inventory.

“We have located and disabled the nefarious user accounts that were involved in illegal scraping,” said a Spotify representative.

The Stockholm-based company, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, added that an investigation into unauthorized access found a third party scraped public metadata and employed questionable tactics to circumvent DRM protections.

Archive's Stated 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 offering links to pirated books, wrote in a blog it wanted to create a ‘historical repository’ for music.

They asserted the music files represented 99.6% of all music listened to by its listeners and would be distributed via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, 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 start,” said Anna’s Archive, which frames its purpose as “safeguarding humanity’s knowledge and heritage”.

AI Training and Copyright Battleground

Ed Newton-Rex for protecting artists’ rights, said the leaked music would likely be utilized for training artificial intelligence systems.

“Training on pirated data is unfortunately widespread in the tech sector, so this accessed music is almost certain to be used instructing AI models,” he stated.

The Anna’s Archive site makes references to a large online archive, a vast online repository of copyrighted books that has allegedly been leveraged by the parent company of Facebook to train its AI models.

The co-founder of an AI startup wrote on the professional network that individuals of the public could in principle “build their own personal free version of Spotify”. He said it could also allow tech companies to “educate models on modern music at scale”.

Intellectual property law has become a battleground between artists, writers and content creators on one side and AI companies on the other.

Policy Proposals and Reactions

In the UK, creative professionals have protested against a government suggestion to let AI companies use protected work without consent unless the rights holder opts out. Almost every participant to a government call for evidence on the proposal has backed artists’ concerns.

A government minister for technology, research and technology informed parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the issue, adding that ministers would “take the time to get this correct”. The administration has pledged to make regulatory plans on AI and copyright by March 2025.