🔗 Share this article Advocacy Collective Claims to Have Extracted Countless of Music Tracks from Spotify An activist organization has claimed to have harvested a vast number of tracks from the popular streaming service and is preparing to release them online. Possible Boost for Artificial Intelligence Development Observers said the apparent leak could aid artificial intelligence firms searching for material to train their models. A group called Anna’s Archive reported it had obtained 86 million music files from Spotify and 256 million entries of associated data such as performer and album names. Spotify, which carries more than 100 million tracks, confirmed that the breach did not represent its full catalog. “We have identified and deactivated the malicious user accounts that were involved in unlawful scraping,” stated a Spotify representative. The Swedish company, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, further explained that an investigation into unauthorised access identified a external actor scraped public metadata and used illicit tactics to circumvent DRM protections. Group's Stated Mission and Worries Spotify does not believe the audio acquired by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is known for offering links to pirated books, wrote in a blog it wanted to create a ‘historical repository’ for music. They claimed the music files accounted for 99.6% of all music streamed to by its listeners and would be distributed via ‘torrents’, a method of exchanging large digital files online. “Naturally the service doesn’t have all the music in the world, but it’s a fantastic start,” said Anna’s Archive, which describes its mission as “preserving humanity’s knowledge and heritage”. Model Development and Intellectual Property Debate A composer and campaigner for defending artists’ rights, said the breached music would likely be used for developing artificial intelligence systems. “Educating models on illegally sourced data is sadly common in the AI industry, so this stolen music is highly likely to end up instructing AI models,” he said. The Anna’s Archive site makes references to LibGen, a vast online repository of copyrighted books that has reportedly been used by the parent company of Facebook to train its AI models. The co-founder of an AI startup wrote on LinkedIn that individuals of the public could in principle “create their own private free version of the service”. The executive said it could also enable tech companies to “educate models on contemporary music at a large volume”. Intellectual property law has become a key issue between creatives, writers and content creators on one side and AI companies on the other. Government Considerations and Responses In the UK, creative professionals have raised concerns against a government proposal to let AI companies utilize protected work without permission unless the rights holder signals. 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, noting that ministers would “use the time to get this correct”. The administration has pledged to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by March 2025.