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An activist group has stated to have harvested a vast number of songs from Spotify and is getting ready to publish them online.

Possible Impetus for AI Training

Observers said the apparent data breach could aid artificial intelligence firms looking for data to develop their models.

An entity called Anna’s Archive reported it had obtained 86 million audio tracks from Spotify and 256 million entries of metadata such as artist and album names. The company, which carries more than 100 million songs, confirmed that the breach did not constitute its entire inventory.

“We have identified and disabled the nefarious user accounts that were involved in illegal scraping,” stated a company representative.

The Swedish company, which has more than 700 million users worldwide, further explained that an investigation into unauthorised access identified a external actor scraped public metadata and used illicit methods to circumvent DRM [digital rights management].

Archive's Stated Goal and Concerns

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 copyright-infringing books, wrote in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.

The group asserted the audio files accounted for 99.6% of all music streamed to by Spotify users and would be distributed via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, a method of exchanging large digital 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 describes its purpose as “preserving humanity’s knowledge and culture”.

Model Development and Copyright Battleground

A composer and campaigner for defending artists’ copyright, said the leaked music would likely be used for training artificial intelligence systems.

“Educating models on illegally sourced data is sadly widespread in the AI industry, so this accessed music is almost certain to be used instructing AI models,” he stated.

The group's website alludes to LibGen, a huge online archive of pirated books that has reportedly been used by Meta to develop its systems.

The co-founder of an AI startup wrote on the professional network that members of the public could in theory “build their own personal free version of Spotify”. The executive said it could also allow tech companies to “train on modern 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 Proposals and Reactions

In the UK, creative professionals have raised concerns against a ministerial suggestion to allow AI companies use protected work without permission unless the rights holder signals. Virtually every respondent to a government consultation on the proposal has backed artists’ apprehensions.

A government minister for technology, research and technology told parliament this month there was “no clear consensus” on the issue, noting that ministers would “use the time to get this correct”. The government has committed to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by next year.