The platform that pirated the contents is called Anna’s Archive. Spotify assures that it has “implemented new security measures”, while the stolen data could be used to train artificial intelligence models
A leak of news, or rather, of songs, from the largest music on demand streaming platform, Spotify. The authors of this intervention are a group of activists from Anna’s Archivethe «shadow library», which pirates content to make it accessible for free. The hackers said they had “accomplished a copy» unauthorized by «millions of songs available on Spotify”, however violating copyright. And now they are preparing to publish them online.
Hacked 99% of Spotify tracks
A large-scale operation, as described by the activists themselves on their blog in a post published on December 20th. The intervention concerns approximately 256 million metadata (equivalent to 99% of Spotify tracks) and 86 million music files, for a total volume close to 300 terabyte.
The popularity metric
“Spotify doesn’t have all the music in the world – warn the hackers – but it’s still an excellent starting point.” They explain that they prioritized the tracks using mostly the “popularity” metric of Spotify, and have already published a selection of the 10 thousand most listened to songs: among these, lyrics by Lady Gaga, Bad Bunny, Taylor Swift, The Weeknd.
Hackers: «A large music archive»
«This is, without a doubt, the largest database of music metadata publicly available – they continue – For comparison, we have 256 million tracks, while others have between 50 and 150 million». They define themselves as holders of «the largest fully open music preservation archive», which means that «anyone who has enough space on their devices can easily replicate it». The data will be distributed via torrent, in stages, on their page.
«New security measures implemented»
An operation that immediately alerted Spotify, based in Stockholm and with over 700 million users worldwide. The company stated that it has «identified and deactivated nefarious user accounts involved in illegal scraping activities». «An investigation into unauthorized access – again Spotify speaking to The Guardian – revealed that a third party stole public metadata and used illicit tactics to bypass DRM (Digital Rights Management) and access some audio files on the platform». The company, however, pointed out that it had “implemented new security measures for these types of anti-copyright attacks” after the announcement of Anna’s Archive and that it had “actively monitored any suspicious behaviori”, thus signaling the urgency of a threat that could have large-scale consequences.
Data to develop artificial intelligence?
However, a further problem emerges: this apparent leak could provide valuable material to AI companies looking for data to develop its own technology. Ed Newton-Rex, composer and activist for the protection of copyright, expressed his opinion on this point. «Training based on pirated material is unfortunately common in the AI industry, so it’s almost certain that this stolen music will end up training AI models. That’s why governments must insist that AI companies disclose the training data they use.”
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December 24, 2025
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