Skype

This article is about the software. For the company that develops it, see Skype Technologies.
Skype
Skype logo

Screenshot of Skype

Screenshot of Skype 7 for Windows Desktop (Windows 8.1)
Original author(s) Priit Kasesalu and Jaan Tallinn
Developer(s) Skype Technologies
(Microsoft Corporation)
Initial release 29 August 2003 (2003-08-29)
Stable release
Development status Active
Written in Delphi, C and C++[14]
Operating system Windows, Macintosh, Linux, Android, iOS, Windows Phone, BlackBerry, Nokia X, Fire OS, Xbox One, Viera Smart TV , PlayStation Vita and PlayStation Portable
Available in 38 languages
Type Videoconferencing, VoIP and Instant messaging
License Freemium (Adware)
Alexa rank Negative increase244 (March 2015)[15]
Website www.skype.com

Skype (/ˈskaɪp/) is an application that provides video chat and voice call services. Users may exchange such digital documents as images, text, video and any others, and may transmit both text and video messages. Skype allows the creation of video conference calls. Skype is available for Microsoft Windows, Macintosh, or Linux, as well as Android, Blackberry, and both Apple and Windows smartphones and tablets.[16] Skype is based on a freemium model. Much of the service is free, but Skype Credit or a subscription is required to call a landline or a mobile phone number. At the end of 2010, there were over 660 million worldwide users, with over 300 million estimated active each month as of August 2015.[17] At one point in February 2012, there were thirty four million users concurrently online on Skype.[18]

First released in August 2003, Skype was created by the Swede Niklas Zennström and the Dane Janus Friis, in cooperation with Ahti Heinla, Priit Kasesalu, and Jaan Tallinn, Estonians who developed the backend that was also used in the music-sharing application Kazaa.[19] In September 2005, eBay acquired Skype for $2.6 billion.[20] In September 2009,[21] Silver Lake, Andreessen Horowitz and the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board announced the acquisition of 65% of Skype for $1.9 billion from eBay, which attributed to the enterprise a market value of $2.92 billion. Microsoft bought Skype in May 2011 for $8.5 billion. Its Skype division headquarters are in Luxembourg, but most of the development team and 44% of all the division's employees are still situated in Tallinn and Tartu, Estonia.[22][23][24]

Skype allows users to communicate over the Internet by voice using a microphone, by video by using a webcam, as well as with instant messaging. Skype-to-Skype calls to other users are free of charge, while calls to landline telephones and mobile phones (over traditional telephone networks) are charged via a debit-based user account system called Skype Credit. Some network administrators have banned Skype on corporate, government, home, and education networks,[25] citing such reasons as inappropriate usage of resources, excessive bandwidth usage, and security concerns.[26]

Skype originally featured a hybrid peer-to-peer and client–server system.[27] Skype has been powered entirely by Microsoft-operated supernodes since May 2012.[28] The 2013 mass surveillance disclosures revealed that Microsoft had granted intelligence agencies unfettered access to supernodes and Skype communication content.[29]

Etymology

The name for the software is derived from "Sky peer-to-peer", which was then abbreviated to "Skyper". However, some of the domain names associated with "Skyper" were already taken.[30] Dropping the final "r" left the current title "Skype", for which domain names were available.[31]

History

Main article: Skype Technologies

Skype was founded in 2003 by Niklas Zennström, from Sweden, and Janus Friis, from Denmark.[32] The Skype software was created by Estonians Ahti Heinla, Priit Kasesalu, and Jaan Tallinn.[33] The first public beta version was released on 29 August 2003.[34]

In June 2005, Skype entered into an agreement with the Polish web portal Onet.pl for an integrated offering on the Polish market.[35] On 12 September 2005, eBay Inc. agreed to acquire Luxembourg-based Skype Technologies SA for approximately US$2.5 billion in up-front cash and eBay stock, plus potential performance-based consideration.[36]

On 1 September 2009, it was announced that eBay was selling 65% of Skype to Silver Lake, Andreessen Horowitz, and the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board for US$1.9 billion, valuing Skype at US$2.75 billion.

Microsoft acquisition

On 10 May 2011, Microsoft Corporation acquired Skype Communications, S.à r.l for US$8.5 billion.[37] The company was incorporated as a division of Microsoft, and Microsoft acquired all of the company's technologies with the purchase. This was completed on 13 October 2011.[37][38]

Shortly after its acquisition, Microsoft began integrating the Skype service with its own products:

Features

Main article: Features of Skype

Registered users of Skype are identified by a unique Skype Name and may be listed in the Skype directory.[42] Skype allows these registered users to communicate through both instant messaging and voice chat. Voice chat allows telephone calls between pairs of users and conference calling and uses a proprietary audio codec. Skype's text chat client allows group chats, emoticons, storing chat history, and editing of previous messages. Offline messages were implemented in a beta of version 5 but removed after a few weeks without notification. The usual features familiar to instant messaging users—user profiles, online status indicators, and so on—are also included.

The Online Number, a.k.a. SkypeIn, service allows Skype users to receive calls on their computers dialed by conventional phone subscribers to a local Skype phone number; local numbers are available for Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Denmark, the Dominican Republic, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Hungary, Ireland, Japan, Mexico, Nepal, New Zealand, Poland, Romania, South Africa, South Korea, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, and the United States.[43][44] A Skype user can have local numbers in any of these countries, with calls to the number charged at the same rate as calls to fixed lines in the country. The countries on this growing list are referred to collectively as the SkypeIn Countries.

Skype supports conference calls, video chats, and screen sharing between 25 people at a time for free.[45][46]

Skype does not provide the ability to call emergency numbers, such as 112 in Europe, 911 in North America, or 100 in India and Nepal.[47] However, as of December 2012, there is limited support for emergency calls in the United Kingdom, Australia, Denmark, and Finland.[48] The U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has ruled that, for the purposes of section 255 of the Telecommunications Act, Skype is not an "interconnected VoIP provider".[49] As a result, the U.S. National Emergency Number Association recommends that all VoIP users have an analog line available as a backup.[50]

On 14 July 2011, Skype partnered with Comcast to bring its video chat service to Comcast subscribers via their HDTV sets.[51]

On 17 June 2013, Skype released a free video-messaging service, which can be operated on Windows, Mac OS, iOS, Android and BlackBerry.[52]

On 12 August 2013, Skype released the 4.10 update to the app for Apple iPhone and iPad that allows HD quality video for iPhone 5 and fourth-generation iPads.[53]

On 20 November 2014, Microsoft Office's team announced that a new chat powered by Skype is going to be implemented in their software, giving tools to be able to chat with co-workers in the same document.[54]

On 15 September 2015, Skype announced the release of Mojis, "a brand new way to express yourself on Skype." Mojis are short clips/gifs featuring characters from films and TV shows to be entered into conversations with the same ease as emoticons. They are working with Universal Studios, Disney Muppets, BBC and other studios to add to the available collection of Mojis.[55]

On 21 December 2015, Gurdeep Singh Pall, Corporate Vice President of Skype, announced that Microsoft acquired the technology from Talko, "maker of an innovative mobile app for on-the-go business communications (...) Together, the new technology and talent will help us deliver great new features and capabilities in both Skype and Skype for Business."[56]

In January 2016, Skype announced it would roll out free group video calling to users on mobile devices, including iOS and Android. In February 2016, Microsoft announced that it had started to introduce group calling on smartphones and tablets in North America and Western Europe.[57]

Usage and traffic

Year International call market share
2005 2.9%[70]
2006 4.4%[70]
2008 8%[69]
2009 12%[68]
2010 13%[71]
2012 33%[72]
2013 36%[73]
2014 40%[74]

In January 2011, after the release of video calling on the Skype client for iPhone, Skype reached a record 27 million simultaneous online users.[75] This record was broken with 29 million simultaneous online users on 21 February 2011[76] and again on 28 March 2011 with 30 million online users.[77] On 25 February 2012, Skype announced that it has over 32 million users for the first time ever.[78] By 5 March 2012, it had 36 million simultaneous online users,[79] and less than a year later, on 21 January 2013, Skype had more than 50 million concurrent users online.[80] In June 2012, Skype had surpassed 70 million downloads on an Android device.[81]

On 19 July 2012, Microsoft announced that Skype users had logged 115 billion minutes of calls over the quarter, up 50% since the last quarter.[82]

On 15 January 2014, TeleGeography estimated that Skype-to-Skype international traffic has gone up to 36% in 2013 to 214 billion minutes.[83]

System and software

Client applications and devices


Windows applications

Version Platforms Description
Desktop Client
  • Fully-featured
  • To be replaced by the new Universal Windows Platform app
Universal (8.1)[84]
  • Previously supported Windows 8 and 8.1 on x86/x64 processors but was discontinued on July 7, 2015[85]
  • Now on Windows Store for PCs appear as "Get Skype" which, after installation, is simply a link to get desktop client
  • To be updated to the new Universal Windows Platform app when Windows 10 Anniversary Update is launched in July 2016
Universal[86]
  • A preview version available to Windows Insider now
  • As an update to the current Universal 8.1 app on Store when Windows 10 Anniversary Update is launched in July 2016
  • To replace the desktop client when all features from the desktop client are incorporated
Integrated Apps on Windows 10[87][88]
  • Not all Skype features available
  • On Store as a bundled app which becomes "Messaging" and "Skype Video" after installation
  • "Messaging" shows SMS and Skype messages
  • "Skype Video" is for video calling through Skype
  • To be replaced by the new Universal Windows Platform app when Windows 10 Anniversary Update is launched in July 2016

Other Desktop programs

Other Mobile devices

(Skype was previously available on selected Symbian and BlackBerry OS devices.)

Skype phones

On 29 October 2007, Skype launched its own mobile phone under the brand name 3 Skypephone, which runs a BREW OS.[89]

Skype also offers a Skype Wi-Fi Phone, which is a wireless mobile phone that allows users to make Skype calls, using a wireless Internet connection. The Skype Wi-Fi Phone has an on-screen menu that lets Skype users see who is online and available to talk, similar to what is seen on a PC. It can also be used to talk with non-Skype users. SkypeOut minutes can be used to call any phone for a low price and no monthly fee. The Skype Wi-Fi phone does not contain a web browser and so can not access hotspots that require web-based login or authentication.[90]

Other platforms

Third party licensing

Third-party developers, such as Truphone, Nimbuzz, and Fring, previously allowed Skype to run in parallel with several other competing VoIP/IM networks (Truphone and Nimbuzz provide TruphoneOut and NimbuzzOut as a competing paid service) in any Symbian or Java environment. Nimbuzz made Skype available to BlackBerry users and Fring provided mobile video calling over Skype as well as support for the Android platform. Skype disabled Fring users from accessing Skype in July 2010.[95] Nimbuzz discontinued support on request of Skype in October 2010.[96]

Before and during the Microsoft acquisition, Skype withdrew licensing from several third parties producing software and hardware compatible with Skype. The Skype for Asterisk product from Digium was withdrawn as "no longer available for sale".[97] The Senao SN358+ long-range (10–15 km) cordless phone was discontinued due to loss of licenses to participate in the Skype network as peers. In combination, these two products made it possible to create roaming cordless mesh networks with robust handoff.

Protocol

Main article: Skype protocol

Skype uses a proprietary Internet telephony (VoIP) network called the Skype protocol. The protocol has not been made publicly available by Skype, and official applications using the protocol are closed-source. Part of the Skype technology relies on the Global Index P2P protocol belonging to the Joltid Ltd. corporation. The main difference between Skype and standard VoIP clients is that Skype operates on a peer-to-peer model (originally based on the Kazaa software[98]), rather than the more usual client–server model (note that the very popular Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) model of VoIP is also peer-to-peer, but implementation generally requires registration with a server, as does Skype).

On June 20, 2014, Microsoft announced the deprecation of the old Skype protocol. Within several months from this date, in order to continue using Skype services, Skype users will have to update to Skype applications released in 2014. The new Skype protocol—Microsoft Notification Protocol 24. The deprecation became effective in the second week of August 2014. Transferred files are now saved on central servers.

As far as networking stack support is concerned, Skype only supports the IPv4 protocol. It lacks support for the next-generation Internet protocol, IPv6.[99]

Protocol detection and control

Many networking and security companies claim to detect and control Skype's protocol for enterprise and carrier applications. While the specific detection methods used by these companies are often private, Pearson's chi-squared test and naive Bayes classification are two approaches that were published in 2008.[100] Combining statistical measurements of payload properties (such as byte frequencies and initial byte sequences) as well as flow properties (like packet sizes and packet directions) has also shown to be an effective method for identifying Skype's TCP- and UDP-based protocols.[101]

Audio codecs

G.729 and SVOPC. Skype added a Skype-created codec called SILK to Skype 4.0 for Windows and other Skype clients. SILK is intended to be "lightweight and embeddable".[102] Additionally, Skype has released Opus as an open-source codec, which integrates the SILK codec principles for voice transmission with the CELT codec principles for higher-quality audio transmissions, such as live music performances. Opus was submitted to the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) in September 2010.[103] Since then, it has been standardized as RFC 6716[104]

Video codecs

VP7 is used for versions prior to Skype 5.5.[105][106][107][108][109]

As of version 7.0, H.264 is used for both standard definition and 720p and 1080p high-definition group and one-on-one video chat.[110][111]

Skype Qik

Main article: Skype Qik

Skype acquired the video service Qik in 2011. After shutting down Qik in April 2014, Skype relaunched the service as Skype Qik on 14 October 2014. Although Qik offered video conferencing and Internet streaming, the new service focuses on mobile video messaging between individuals and groups.[112]

Security and privacy

Main article: Skype security

Skype was claimed initially to be a secure communication, with one of its early web pages stating "highly secure with end-to-end encryption".[113] Security services were invisible to the user, and encryption cannot be disabled. Skype reportedly uses publicly documented, widely trusted encryption techniques: RSA for key negotiation and the Advanced Encryption Standard to encrypt conversations.[114] However, it is impossible to verify that these algorithms are used correctly, completely, and at all times, as there is no public review possible without a protocol specification and/or the program source code. Skype provides an uncontrolled registration system for users with no proof of identity. Instead, a free choice of nicknames permits users to use the system without revealing their identities to other users. It is trivial to set up an account using any name; the displayed caller's name is no guarantee of authenticity. A third-party paper analyzing the security and methodology of Skype was presented at Black Hat Europe 2006. It analyzed Skype and found a number of security issues with the then-current security model.[115]

Skype incorporates some features which tend to hide its traffic, but it is not specifically designed to thwart traffic analysis and therefore does not provide anonymous communication. Some researchers have been able to watermark the traffic so that it is identifiable even after passing through an anonymizing network.[116]

In an interview, Kurt Sauer, the Chief Security Officer of Skype, said, "We provide a safe communication option. I will not tell you whether we can listen or not."[117] This does not deny the fact that the NSA monitors Skype conversations. Skype's client uses an undocumented and proprietary protocol. The Free Software Foundation (FSF) is concerned by user privacy issues arising from using proprietary software and protocols and has made a replacement for Skype one of their high-priority projects.[118] Security researchers Biondi and Desclaux have speculated that Skype may have a back door, since Skype sends traffic even when it is turned off and because Skype has taken extreme measures to obfuscate their traffic and functioning of their program.[119] Several media sources reported that at a meeting about the "Lawful interception of IP based services" held on 25 June 2008, high-ranking unnamed officials at the Austrian interior ministry said that they could listen in on Skype conversations without problems. Austrian public broadcasting service ORF, citing minutes from the meeting, reported that "the Austrian police are able to listen in on Skype connections". Skype declined to comment on the reports.[120][121] One easily demonstrated method of monitoring is to set up two computers with the same Skype user ID and password. When a message is typed or a call is received on one computer, the second computer duplicates the audio and text. This requires knowledge of the user ID and password.

The United States Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has interpreted the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA) as requiring digital phone networks to allow wiretapping if authorized by an FBI warrant, in the same way as other phone services. In February 2009, Skype said that, not being a telephone company owning phone lines, it is exempt from CALEA and similar laws, which regulate US phone companies, and in fact, it is not clear whether Skype could support wiretapping even if it wanted to.[122] According to the ACLU, the Act is inconsistent with the original intent of the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution;[123] more recently, the ACLU has expressed the concern that the FCC interpretation of the Act is incorrect.[124][125] It has been suggested that Microsoft made changes to Skype's infrastructure to ease various wiretapping requirements;[126] however, Skype denies the claims.[127]

Some time before Skype was sold in 2009, the company had started its own program, called Project Chess, to explore legal and technical ways to easily share calls with intelligence agencies and law enforcement.[128]

On 20 February 2009, the European Union's Eurojust agency announced that the Italian Desk at Eurojust would "play a key role in the coordination and cooperation of the investigations on the use of internet telephony systems (VoIP), such as 'Skype'. ... The purpose of Eurojust's coordination role is to overcome the technical and judicial obstacles to the interception of internet telephony systems, taking into account the various data protection rules and civil rights"[129]

In November 2010, a flaw was disclosed to Skype that showed how hackers could secretly track any user's IP address.[130] As of 2015, this has still not been fixed.[131]

In 2012, Skype introduced automatic updates to better protect users from security risks but received some challenge from users of the Mac product, as the updates cannot be disabled from version 5.6 on,[132] both on Mac OS and Windows versions, although in the latter, and only from version 5.9 on, automatic updating can be turned off in certain cases.[133]

According to a 2012 Washington Post article, Skype "has expanded its cooperation with law enforcement authorities to make online chats and other user information available to police"; the article additionally mentions Skype made changes to allow authorities access to addresses and credit card numbers.[134]

In November 2012, Skype was reported to have handed over user data of a pro-Wikileaks activist to Dallas, Texas-based private security company iSIGHT Partners without a warrant or court order. The alleged handover would be a breach of Skype's privacy policy. Skype responded with a statement that it launched an internal investigation to probe the breach of user data privacy.[135]

13 November 2012, a Russian user published a flaw in Skype's security, which allowed any person to take over a Skype account knowing only the victim's email by following 7 steps.[136][137] This vulnerability was claimed to exist for months and existed for more than 12 hours since published widely.

14 May 2013, it was documented that a URL sent via a Skype instant messaging session was usurped by the Skype service and subsequently used in a HTTP HEAD query originating from an IP address registered to Microsoft in Redmond (the IP address used was 65.52.100.214). The Microsoft query used the full URL supplied in the IM conversation and was generated by a previously undocumented security service.[138] Security experts speculate the action was triggered by a technology similar to Microsoft's SmartScreen Filter used in its browsers.[139]

The 2013 mass surveillance disclosures revealed that agencies such as the NSA and the FBI have the ability to eavesdrop on Skype, including the monitoring and storage of text and video calls and file transfers.[29][140][141] The PRISM surveillance program, which requires FISA court authorization, reportedly has allowed the NSA unfettered access to its data center supernodes. According to the leaked documents, integration work began in November 2010, but it was not until February 2011 that the company was served with a directive to comply signed by the attorney general,[29] with NSA documents showing that collection began on 31 March 2011.[142]

On 10 November 2014, Skype scored 1 out of 7 points on the Electronic Frontier Foundation's secure messaging scorecard. Skype received a point for encryption during transit but lost points because communications are not encrypted with a key the provider doesn't have access to (i.e. the communications are not end-to-end encrypted), users can't verify contacts' identities, past messages are not secure if the encryption keys are stolen (i.e. the service does not provide forward secrecy), the code is not open to independent review (i.e. the code is not open-source), the security design is not properly documented, and there has not been a recent independent security audit.[143][144][145] AIM, BlackBerry Messenger, Ebuddy XMS, Hushmail, Kik Messenger, Viber and Yahoo Messenger also scored 1 out of 7 points.[143]

Service in the People's Republic of China

Since September 2007, users in China trying to download the Skype software client have been redirected to the site of TOM Online, a joint venture between a Chinese wireless operator and Skype, from which a modified Chinese version can be downloaded.[146] The TOM client participates in China's system of Internet censorship, monitoring text messages between Skype users in China as well as messages exchanged with users outside the country.[147][148] Niklas Zennström, then chief executive of Skype, told reporters that TOM "had implemented a text filter, which is what everyone else in that market is doing. Those are the regulations." He also stated, "One thing that's certain is that those things are in no way jeopardising the privacy or the security of any of the users."[149]

In October 2008, it was reported that TOM had been saving the full message contents of some Skype text conversations on its servers, apparently focusing on conversations containing political issues such as Tibet, Falun Gong, Taiwan independence, and the Chinese Communist Party. The saved messages contain personally identifiable information about the message senders and recipients, including IP addresses, usernames, landline phone numbers, and the entire content of the text messages, including the time and date of each message. Information about Skype users outside China who were communicating with a TOM-Skype user was also saved. A server misconfiguration made these log files accessible to the public for a time.[148][150][151]

Research on the TOM-Skype venture has revealed information about blacklisted keyword checks, allowing censorship and surveillance of its users. The partnership has received much criticism for the latter. Microsoft remains unavailable for comment on the issue.[152]

According to reports from the advocacy group Great Fire, Microsoft has modified censorship restrictions and ensured encryption of all user information.[152] Furthermore, Microsoft is now partnered with Guangming Founder (GMF) in China.[153]

No Skype calls to India and Pakistan landline and mobile

"As of 10 November 2014, Skype will end support for calling within India meaning calls to mobiles and landlines from Skype within India will no longer be available," Skype's parent company Microsoft said in a statement on 8 October 2014. Microsoft said, "Users in India can still make free Skype-to-Skype calls worldwide, international calls to mobiles and landlines and users outside the country can call mobiles and landlines in India."[154]

Localization

Skype comes bundled with the following locales and languages: Arabic, Bulgarian, Catalan, Chinese (Traditional and Simplified), Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, Hungarian, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Latvian, Lithuanian, Nepali, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese (Brazilian and European), Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish, Swedish, Thai, Turkish, Ukrainian, and Vietnamese.

As the program (on Windows) offers users the option of creating new language files, at least 80 other (full or partial) localizations are also available for many languages.[155]

URIs

Skype uses URIs as skype:USER?call for a call.

Customer service

As of February 2012, Skype provides support through their web-support portal, support community, @skypesupport on Twitter, and Skype Facebook page. Direct contact via email and live chat is available through their web-support portal. Chat Support is a premium feature available to Skype Premium and some other paid users.

In January 2010, Skype rescinded their policy of seizing funds in Skype accounts that have been inactive (no paid call) for 180 days. This was in settlement of a class-action lawsuit.[156] Skype also paid up to US$4 to persons who opted into the action.

Skype's refund policy states that they will provide refunds in full if customers have used less than 1 euro of their Skype Credit. "Upon a duly submitted request, Skype will refund you on a pro rata basis for the unused period of a Product".

Skype has come under some criticism from users for the inability to completely close accounts. Users not wanting to continue using Skype can make their account inactive by deleting all personal information, except for the username.[157]

Due to an outage happened in September 21, 2015, that affected several users in New Zealand, Australia and other countries, Skype decided to compensate their customers with 20 minutes of free calls to over 60 landline and 8 mobile phone numbers.[158]

Educational use

Although Skype is a commercial product, its free version is being used with increasing frequency among teachers and schools interested in global education projects.[159] For example, Skype is being used to facilitate language exchange: Students in different parts of the world are paired off, and each is a native speaker of the language that the other wishes to learn. In conversations over Skype, they alternate between the two languages.[160][161][162]

Teachers are using Skype in unique ways to fulfill educational goals. The videoconferencing aspect of the software is valuable in that it provides a way to connect students who speak different languages, hold virtual field trips, and reach out to experts in varying fields of study. These experiences allow students a chance to apply what they are learning in the classroom to real-life experiences, and it also achieves further learning opportunities.[163][164]

Skype in the classroom is another free tool that Skype has set up on its website. It provides teachers with a way to make their classrooms more interactive and interesting. Skype in the classroom is a service that teachers can sign up for that will allow students to meet other students, talk to experts, and share ideas. Teachers can collaborate with other teachers around the world and design different learning experiences for their students. There are various Skype lessons, in which students can participate. Teachers can also use Skype's search tool and find experts in the field of their choice.[165] Most of the schools in United States and Europe often block Skype from the school network for students and hence students are left no option but to unblock it through various vpns and proxy.[166]

See also

Competitors:

References

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