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An activist group has claimed to have harvested millions of songs from the popular streaming service and is getting ready to publish them online.

Potential Impetus for Artificial Intelligence Development

Observers noted the seeming leak could aid AI companies searching for data to develop their technology.

An entity known as Anna’s Archive said it had obtained 86 million audio tracks from the platform and 256 million rows of associated data such as artist and record names. Spotify, which hosts more than 100 million songs, stated that the leak did not constitute its full catalog.

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

The Swedish company, which has more than 700 million subscribers worldwide, added that an investigation into unauthorised access identified a external actor scraped public metadata and used questionable methods to circumvent DRM protections.

Archive's Declared Goal and Worries

The streaming service does not believe the music taken by Anna’s Archive has been made public yet. Anna’s Archive, which is recognized for providing links to copyright-infringing books, said in a blog it wanted to create a ‘preservation archive’ for music.

The group asserted the music files represented 99.6% of all music listened to by Spotify users 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 fantastic start,” said Anna’s Archive, which describes its mission as “preserving humanity’s knowledge and heritage”.

AI Training and Intellectual Property Debate

A composer and campaigner for protecting artists’ copyright, said the breached music would probably be used for developing artificial intelligence systems.

“Educating models on pirated material is sadly common 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 a large online archive, a vast online archive of copyrighted books that has reportedly been leveraged by Meta to develop its AI models.

The co-founder of an artificial intelligence company posted on the professional network that individuals of the public could in principle “build their own personal free equivalent of Spotify”. He added it could also allow tech companies to “educate models on contemporary music at a large volume”.

Copyright has emerged as a battleground between creatives, writers and content creators on one side and AI companies on the other.

Policy Considerations and Reactions

Across Britain, creative professionals have protested against a government suggestion to let AI companies utilize copyright-protected work without permission unless the rights holder opts out. Almost every participant to a government call for evidence on the idea has backed artists’ concerns.

A government minister for technology, innovation and technology told parliament this month there was “little consensus” on the issue, noting that ministers would “use the time to get this correct”. The administration has committed to make policy proposals on AI and copyright by next year.