Spotify and Major Labels Win $322M in Music Piracy Lawsuit

Spotify and the three major label groups have been awarded a nine-figure copyright judgment against the pirate library Anna’s Archive — though at least for now, the victory is largely symbolic as the site is anonymously operated.

A federal judge entered default judgment on Tuesday (April 14) against Anna’s Archive, which announced in a blog post this past December that it had scraped 86 million songs from Spotify and planned to distribute them via a series of bulk torrents. Spotify teamed up with Universal Music Group (UMG), Warner Music Group (WMG) and Sony to sue the site’s shadowy operators for this “brazen theft” in January.

Judge Jed S. Rakoff granted an immediate restraining order that barred Anna’s Archive from distributing the stolen songs, but the site’s operators never responded to the lawsuit. Undeterred, they released torrents in February that included access to more than 2 billion illegal music files, 120,000 of which were downloaded by Spotify’s lawyers as a test.

Now, Judge Rakoff is holding Anna’s Archive liable by default for violations of U.S. copyright law. He awarded $300 million in damages to Spotify — calculated by multiplying 120,000 by $2,500, the maximum damages available for each time that Anna’s Archive circumvented Spotify’s anti-piracy measures.  

The judge also awarded UMG, WMG and Sony a total of $22.2 million, equal to the maximum damages of $150,000 per act of copyright infringement multiplied by 148 major-label owned recordings identified in the Anna’s Archive collection. This includes hits by Beyoncé, Ariana Grande, Bruno Mars, Cardi B, Justin Bieber, Lady Gaga, Post Malone, Mariah Carey, Miley Cyrus, Rihanna, Shakira, Michael Jackson and U2.

While $322.2 million is a big number, it’s unlikely that Spotify or the majors will see this cash any time soon. That’s because the identities of the Anna’s Archive operators remain unknown, making it nearly impossible, at this point, to enforce the money judgment.

The more immediately impactful piece of Tuesday’s default judgment ruling is a permanent injunction that requires internet service providers to perpetually disable the Anna’s Archive website. Yet this too may prove difficult to enforce, since Anna’s Archive has been known to relaunch its operations on new domain names each time one is shut down.

Reps for Spotify and the labels did not immediately return requests for comment on Tuesday’s judgment.