Overview
- Anna’s Archive claims it scraped 256 million metadata records and 86 million audio files—under 300 TB—purporting to cover about 99.6% of plays, a scale Spotify has not verified.
- The group says the cache is being shared via large torrents organized by popularity, with reporting indicating partial releases to date and broader distribution planned.
- Spotify confirms unauthorized access to public data and “some” audio, says the offending accounts were deactivated, and notes additional security measures and active monitoring.
- Industry sources warn the dataset could enable pirate replicas or be used to train AI on copyrighted music, posing legal and business-model risks for rights holders.
- Anna’s Archive frames the operation as noncommercial preservation of culture, while Spotify describes the activity as illegal scraping and piracy under its terms.