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An activist organization has stated to have scraped millions of tracks from the popular streaming service and is getting ready to release them publicly.

Possible Boost for AI Training

Industry experts said the seeming leak could boost AI companies looking for data to develop their models.

An entity known as Anna’s Archive reported it had obtained 86 million music files from Spotify and 256 million entries of metadata such as performer and album names. The company, which hosts more than 100 million songs, confirmed that the leak did not constitute its full catalog.

“We have identified and deactivated the malicious user accounts that were involved in illegal scraping,” said a company spokesperson.

The Stockholm-based company, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, further explained that an inquiry into unauthorised access identified a external actor collected public metadata and employed illicit methods to bypass DRM protections.

Archive's Stated Goal and Concerns

Spotify does not believe the music taken by Anna’s Archive has been released yet. Anna’s Archive, which is known for offering links to copyright-infringing books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘historical repository’ for music.

The group asserted the music files accounted for 99.6% of all music listened to by its listeners and would be shared via ‘peer-to-peer networks’, a means of sharing large data files online.

“Naturally 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 “preserving humanity’s knowledge and culture”.

Model Development and Intellectual Property Debate

Ed Newton-Rex for protecting artists’ copyright, said the leaked music would likely be used for developing artificial intelligence systems.

“Training on pirated material is sadly widespread in the tech sector, so this stolen music is almost certain to be used instructing AI models,” he said.

The Anna’s Archive site makes references to a large online archive, a huge online repository of pirated books that has reportedly been used by the parent company of Facebook to train its AI models.

The co-founder of an AI startup posted on the professional network that individuals of the public could in principle “build their own private free equivalent of the service”. The executive added it could also allow technology firms to “educate models on modern music at a large volume”.

Intellectual property law has become a key issue between creatives, authors and content creators on one side and tech giants on the other.

Government Proposals and Responses

In the UK, artists and writers have raised concerns against a government suggestion to let AI companies utilize copyright-protected work without permission unless the rights holder opts out. Virtually every participant to a government consultation on the proposal has supported artists’ concerns.

A government minister for science, research and development 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 regulatory plans on AI and copyright by next year.