FastTrack is a

peer-to-peer Peer-to-peer (P2P) computing or networking is a distributed application architecture that partitions tasks or workloads between peers. Peers are equally privileged, equipotent participants in the network, forming a peer-to-peer network of Node ...

(P2P)

protocol Protocol may refer to: Sociology and politics * Protocol (politics) Protocol originally (in Late Middle English, c. 15th century) meant the minutes or logbook taken at a meeting, upon which an agreement was based. The term now commonly refers to ...

that was used by the

Kazaa Kazaa Media Desktop ( ) (once stylized as "KaZaA", but later usually written "Kazaa") was a peer-to-peer file sharing application using the FastTrack protocol licensed by Joltid Ltd. and operated as Kazaa by Sharman Networks. Kazaa was subsequ ...

Grokster Grokster Ltd. was a privately owned software company based in Nevis, West Indies that created the Grokster peer-to-peer file-sharing client in 2001 that used the FastTrack protocol. Grokster Ltd. was rendered extinct in late 2005 by the United S ...

iMesh iMesh was a media and file sharing client that was available in nine languages. It used a proprietary, centralized, P2P network (IM2Net) operating on ports 80, 443 and 1863. iMesh was owned by American company iMesh, Inc., who maintained dev ...

and

Morpheus Morpheus ('Fashioner', derived from the meaning 'form, shape') is a god associated with sleep and dreams. In Ovid's ''Metamorphoses'' he is the son of Somnus (Sleep, the Roman counterpart of Hypnos) and appears in dreams in human form. From the ...

file sharing File sharing is the practice of distributing or providing access to digital media, such as computer programs, multimedia (audio, images and video), documents or electronic books. Common methods of storage, transmission and dispersion include ...

programs. FastTrack was the most popular file sharing network in 2003, and used mainly for the exchange of music

MP3 MP3 (formally MPEG-1 Audio Layer III or MPEG-2 Audio Layer III) is a coding format for digital audio developed largely by the Fraunhofer Society in Germany under the lead of Karlheinz Brandenburg. It was designed to greatly reduce the amount ...

files. The network had approximately 2.4 million

concurrent user In computer science, the number of concurrent users (sometimes abbreviated as CCU) for a resource in a location, with the location being a computing network or a single computer, refers to the total number of people simultaneously accessing or usi ...

s in 2003. It is estimated that the total number of users was greater than that of

Napster Napster was an American proprietary peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing application primarily associated with digital audio file distribution. Founded by Shawn Fanning and Sean Parker, the platform originally launched on June 1, 1999. Audio shared ...

at its peak.

History

The FastTrack protocol and Kazaa were created and developed by

Estonia Estonia, officially the Republic of Estonia, is a country in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the Baltic Sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, and to the east by Ru ...

n programmers of BlueMoon Interactive headed by

Jaan Tallinn Jaan Tallinn (born 14 February 1972) is an Estonian computer programmer and investor known for his participation in the development of Skype and file-sharing application FastTrack/Kazaa. Recognized as a prominent figure in the field of artificia ...

, the same team that later created

Skype Skype () was a proprietary telecommunications application operated by Skype Technologies, a division of Microsoft, best known for IP-based videotelephony, videoconferencing and voice calls. It also had instant messaging, file transfer, ...

. After selling it to

Niklas Zennström Niklas Zennström (; born 16 February 1966) is a Swedish entrepreneur and technology investor. He is co-founder of the charity organization Zennström Philanthropies. Education Zennström attended high school at Katedralskolan, Uppsala. He ha ...

from

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. It borders Norway to the west and north, and Finland to the east. At , Sweden is the largest Nordic count ...

and

Janus Friis Janus Friis (; born 26 June 1976) is a Danish entrepreneur best known for co-founding the file-sharing application Kazaa, and the peer-to-peer telephony application Skype. In September 2005, he and his business partner Niklas Zennström sold Sk ...

from

Denmark Denmark is a Nordic countries, Nordic country in Northern Europe. It is the metropole and most populous constituent of the Kingdom of Denmark,, . also known as the Danish Realm, a constitutionally unitary state that includes the Autonomous a ...

, it was introduced in March 2001 by their

Dutch Dutch or Nederlands commonly refers to: * Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands ** Dutch people as an ethnic group () ** Dutch nationality law, history and regulations of Dutch citizenship () ** Dutch language () * In specific terms, i ...

company Consumer Empowerment. It appeared during the end of the first generation of

P2P networks Peer-to-peer (P2P) computing or networking is a distributed application architecture that partitions tasks or workloads between peers. Peers are equally privileged, equipotent participants in the network, forming a peer-to-peer network of node ...

–

shut down in July of that year. There are three FastTrack-based networks, and they use mutually incompatible versions of the protocol. The most popular clients on each are Kazaa (and its variations), Grokster, and iMesh. For more information about the various

lawsuit A lawsuit is a proceeding by one or more parties (the plaintiff or claimant) against one or more parties (the defendant) in a civil court of law. The archaic term "suit in law" is found in only a small number of laws still in effect today ...

s surrounding Kazaa and

Sharman Networks Kazaa Media Desktop ( ) (once stylized as "KaZaA", but later usually written "Kazaa") was a peer-to-peer file sharing application using the FastTrack protocol licensed by Joltid Ltd. and operated as Kazaa by Sharman Networks. Kazaa was subsequ ...

, see

Technology

FastTrack uses supernodes to improve

scalability Scalability is the property of a system to handle a growing amount of work. One definition for software systems specifies that this may be done by adding resources to the system. In an economic context, a scalable business model implies that ...

. To allow downloading from multiple sources, FastTrack employs the

UUHash UUHash is a hash algorithm employed by clients on the FastTrack network. It is employed for its ability to hash very large files in a very short period of time, even on older computers. However, this is achieved by only hashing a fraction of the fi ...

hashing algorithm A hash function is any function that can be used to map data of arbitrary size to fixed-size values, though there are some hash functions that support variable-length output. The values returned by a hash function are called ''hash values'', ...

. While UUHash allows very large

files File or filing may refer to: Mechanical tools and processes * File (tool), a tool used to remove fine amounts of material from a workpiece. **Filing (metalworking), a material removal process in manufacturing ** Nail file, a tool used to gentl ...

to be

checksum A checksum is a small-sized block of data derived from another block of digital data for the purpose of detecting errors that may have been introduced during its transmission or storage. By themselves, checksums are often used to verify dat ...

med in a short time, even on slow weak

computer A computer is a machine that can be Computer programming, programmed to automatically Execution (computing), carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations (''computation''). Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic set ...

s, it also allows for massive

corruption Corruption is a form of dishonesty or a criminal offense that is undertaken by a person or an organization that is entrusted in a position of authority to acquire illicit benefits or abuse power for one's gain. Corruption may involve activities ...

of a file to go unnoticed. Many people, as well as the

RIAA The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/o ...

, have exploited this

vulnerability Vulnerability refers to "the quality or state of being exposed to the possibility of being attacked or harmed, either physically or emotionally." The understanding of social and environmental vulnerability, as a methodological approach, involves ...

to spread corrupt and fake files on the network. The FastTrack protocol uses

encryption In Cryptography law, cryptography, encryption (more specifically, Code, encoding) is the process of transforming information in a way that, ideally, only authorized parties can decode. This process converts the original representation of the inf ...

and was not

documented A document is a written, drawn, presented, or memorialized representation of thought, often the manifestation of non-fictional, as well as fictional, content. The word originates from the Latin ', which denotes a "teaching" or "lesson": t ...

by its creators. The first clients were all

closed source software Proprietary software is software that grants its creator, publisher, or other rightsholder or rightsholder partner a legal monopoly by modern copyright and intellectual property law to exclude the recipient from freely sharing the software or modi ...

. However, initialization data for the encryption algorithms is sent in the clear and no

public key Public-key cryptography, or asymmetric cryptography, is the field of cryptographic systems that use pairs of related keys. Each key pair consists of a public key and a corresponding private key. Key pairs are generated with cryptographic alg ...

encryption is used, so

reverse engineering Reverse engineering (also known as backwards engineering or back engineering) is a process or method through which one attempts to understand through deductive reasoning how a previously made device, process, system, or piece of software accompl ...

was made comparatively easy. In 2003,

open source Open source is source code that is made freely available for possible modification and redistribution. Products include permission to use and view the source code, design documents, or content of the product. The open source model is a decentrali ...

programmer A programmer, computer programmer or coder is an author of computer source code someone with skill in computer programming. The professional titles Software development, ''software developer'' and Software engineering, ''software engineer' ...

s succeeded in reverse-engineering the portion of the protocol dealing with client- supernode communication, but the supernode-supernode communication protocol remains largely unknown.

Clients

The following programs are or have been FastTrack clients: *

and variants * KCeasy (requires the gIFT-fasttrack plugin) *

, until 2002 * Apollon - KDE-Based * giFT-FastTrack – a

giFT A gift or present is an item given to someone (who is not already the owner) without the expectation of payment or anything in return. Although gift-giving might involve an expectation of reciprocity, a gift is intended to be free. In many cou ...

plugin *

MLDonkey MLDonkey is an open-source, multi-protocol, peer-to-peer file sharing application that runs as a back-end server application on many platforms. It can be controlled through a user interface provided by one of many separate front-ends, including ...

, a free multi-platform multi-network file sharing client

References

External links

giFT-FastTrack home page
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fasttrack File sharing networks File transfer protocols

History

Technology

Clients

See also

References

External links