- Some of Suno’s Music Ripping Tactics Have Been Revealed
- Hacked code shows tracks were ripped from YouTube Music and Deezer
- AI music creator faces multiple lawsuits from artists
It’s unlikely to surprise you that an AI company created training data on copyrighted works without permission or compensation, but a new hack from AI music creator Suno has apparently revealed just how egregious the data theft has been.
As reported by 404 Media, a hacker known as ellie.191 was able to access Suno’s source code and training libraries, finding references to platforms such as YouTube, YouTube Music, Deezer, Genius and the International Music Score Library Project.
The newly revealed data dates back to 2023 and 2024, and refers to 2,013,545 tracks pulled from YouTube Music, as well as 12,287 hours of music ingested from Deezer. We’re talking decades of tunes.
Some of Suno’s alleged ripping tactics are also revealed in the code: It appears that its song grabber searches for acapella versions of tracks on YouTube for vocal training, while the software also targeted a large number of podcasts.
Lawsuits in process
Suno already faces multiple ongoing lawsuits over the practice of training its AI on copyrighted songs without permission, including one filed involving the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).
The argument is not whether or not Suno has copied this music (it is admittedly using “essentially every music file of reasonable quality that is accessible on the open Internet” for AI training), but rather whether it counts as “fair use.”
It is a story that also unfolds in other creative fields, such as writing, photography and film. AI models need human-created content to function properly, but AI companies generally don’t seem interested in paying for it.
Most commenters reacting online express a lack of surprise that this is what Suno has been doing: one Redditor writes “this is literally what every LLM in existence does,” while another calls the practice “an astonishing rip-off.”
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