Patent ID: 7310644

Claim:
A method, implemented in a computer, the method comprising: generating file information for a file at the computer, wherein the file information is different from the file and based at least in part on data in the file, and wherein the generating comprises generating file information only for files stored at the computer that satisfy certain criteria; transferring the file information to a database server computer, wherein the file information is to be compared to file information from one or more other computers to determine whether the file is potentially identical to another file on one of the one or more other computers, wherein said transferring does not transfer the file associated with said file information; associating, with the generated file information, a time to live component that identifies to how many additional database server computers the file information can be communicated, wherein the time to live component limits the number of additional database server computers to which the file information can be communicated; and causing removal, from at least one computer, of one or more files determined to be identical to another file and causing a pointer to said another file to be set up in place of removed files.