Biden Administration Has Compiled Records on 54 Million Gun Owners in the Last Year

By
Dan Zimmerman
-
132

The Biden administration in just the past year alone stockpiled the records of more than 54 million U.S. gun owners and is poised to drastically alter gun regulations to ensure that information on Americans who own firearms ultimately ends up in the federal government’s hands, according to internal Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) documents obtained by the Washington Free Beacon.

The ATF in fiscal year 2021 processed 54.7 million out-of-business records, according to an internal ATF document obtained by the Gun Owners of America, a firearms advocacy group, and provided exclusively to the Free Beacon. When a licensed gun store goes out of business, its private records detailing gun transactions become ATF property and are stored at a federal site in West Virginia. This practice allows the federal government to stockpile scores of gun records and has drawn outrage from gun advocacy groups that say the government is using this information to create a national database of gun owners—which has long been prohibited under U.S. law.

The ATF obtained 53.8 million paper records and another 887,000 electronic records, according to the internal document that outlines ATF actions in fiscal year 2021. Gun activists described this figure as unusually high and said it contributes to fears that the Biden administration is trying to keep track of all Americans who own firearms, in violation of federal statutes. The procurement of these records by the ATF comes as the Biden administration moves to alter current laws to ensure that gun records are stored in perpetuity. Currently, gun shops can destroy their records every 20 years, thereby preventing the ATF from accessing the information in the future.

— Adam Kredo in Biden Admin Amassing Millions of Records on US Gun Owners Amid New Crackdown on Firearms

RELATED ARTICLESMORE FROM AUTHOR

132 COMMENTS

  1. I lost my bolt action rifle when my boat sunk after I shot a great white shark with a scuba tank in its mouth.

    I suppose the Brandon administration can destroy my record.

    • I lost mine in Afghanistan. Brandon’s going to have to get on his hands and knees and beg (and possibly perform some favors for) the Taliban if he wants them.

      • Why it’s just like hitler and the ss knew where all the Jews were…Feeling a little Jewish today? But what do you expect coming from Jim Crow Gun Control joe and his democRat Party ilk? Gun Control started long ago with evil intentions and such intentions never ever go away…they just lay in wait for the right tyrant.

        The problem lies with far too many Gun Owners who get their panties in a wad over trivial matters while sneaky Gun Control and its diabolical baggage sails past their heads…not once but over and over.

        Well I for one do not belong to the club who fears offending the status quo. That is why I am working to see The 1968 Gun Control Act ripped from the books. I cannot sit back while filth equal to slave shacks, nooses, Eugenics and other race based atrocities enjoys standing in law books and courts like Gun Control does in America. It’s way past time that Gun Control receives the justice History Confirms It Deserves.

        • I could not agree with you more. Virtually everything they do-and double down on- whether it’s infringement on this right or all the others as they’ve done with the Plandemic has been to tell us all ” Remove you hat and avert your eyes from me,Jew! We’re your Ubermensch Overlords and You’re All Deplorable Plague Rats” …in short, NOTHING matters more to them then using a suborned and weaponized government to force others heads down . Because if they’re not Over Everyone Else,in their minds they don’t exist
          Classic Zero Sum Thinking and projection.
          Remember-according to them,if we disagree with them on ANYTHING, we’re the Second Coming Of The Nazis…as they engage in Nazi policies and overreaching, intrusive enforcement

  2. Can we get our machine guns back since virtually every other aspect of the FOPA 86 has been ignored?

  3. Yeah, I have them. Come and take them.

    We have been warning about the scanning and digitizing of shop records during ATF inspections since at least the late 90’s.

    • they won’t come and take them. they’ll just cancel your bank account and credit cards, shut off your internet and phone, disconnect your power and water, and recall your driver’s license and any other licenses you have. then they’ll forget about you and get back in the jacuzzi with epsteen and the other boolsheviks.

  4. Maybe we should go back to the days when the list of Americans who own guns looked like this;

    Basically everybody.

  5. I was paddling across a lake in Minnesota, I forget which one, with my entire gun collection, in order to have it appraised by a dealer on the opposite shore. A rogue wave came up and swamped the boat. I was lucky to escape with my life.

    • Same here in SoCal. I was driving across a “dry lake” in our vast high desert, when out of nowhere a Tremors worm burrowed up to my vehichle’s path. As I drove over it, my gun safe and all my gear fell out the back of the truck into the ground. The Trenors worm ate my stuff, but I was able to drve away wuth my life.

      That day, I learned that dry lakes are as dangerous as wet ones.

      • It has been 10 months and 1 day since this whelp failed to answer President Trump’s urgent call to action. He insulted true patriots further by claiming his absence was due to the fakedemic. What a coward and đŸ€Ą this ‘man’ is. Be wary!!!

      • ‘Scuzi the spelling errors. I was reading TTAG on my phone (rare) *and* without my reading glasses.

  7. What this says to me is that 54 million 4473’s were actually looked at by the ATF from a list of gun stores that have gone out of business over the last twenty years.

    ok…

    I’m not sure what everyone expected here but we are not talking about a huge warehouse filled with easily lost crates like at the end of an Indiana Jones movie. We all knew that the standard practice was to give up the paperwork at that point. With everything that has been going on, did ya really think they would not look?

    With the current set of rules, laws, and practices…the ONLY way to prevent this is if you run a gun store, you cannot officially go out of business for atleast twenty years after your last gun sale (or suffer a catastrophic fire – which with BLM hangin around is a very real possibility).

    I have a hard time believing that this is all that much of a surprise to the GOA. I mean really, all they had to do was look.

    • As of 20 years and 1 day ALL the FFL(s) need to start shredding (via perforation shredders) all their 4473(s) as allowed by law. There’s a reason that law was passed and nobody has been elected to office that has had the lawful power to change it without the due process of law. If nothing else it will save on storage space.

      • Not that I disagree, but . . . do you HONESTLY believe the FBI does not retain a digital record of every 4473 when the NICS check is done? If you do, I have some oceanfront property in North Dakota I’d like to offer you.

        • I like North Dakota. It’s like Northern Europe except with more gun ranges.

          I’ve solidly suspected the Federal Bureau of Leftist and Clinton Matters has logged EVERY single query they’ve ever made in any computer whatsoever. They have to in the event of audits by the GAO if nothing else and it’s how they get funding. They’re every bit the intelligence agency that they’ve ever been a law enforcement agency. I’ve also long suspected they and the ATF actually share NIICS and 4473 data to match both functions up.

          But again like I said; SHRED/PERFORATE THEM ALL SIMPLY BECAUSE YOU CAN 
 won’t be long before the tyrannical and paranoid bastards take that away too.

        • Do you honestly know a damn thing that gets told to the FBI in a background check?
          No. You don’t.

          The FBI isn’t told anything other than the buyers information and……wait for it……handgun, long gun or other firearm.

          No serial#, no manufacturer name, no model.

          How can you have an intelligent conversation about firearms law when you don’t know squat about firearms law?

        • I agree completely. I’d bet both the Federal Bureau of Incompetents and the State bureaus have been keeping track of who has bought what for a long time. Waiting for the day they can send their StĂŒrmabteilung Lackies to kick down our doors.

  8. It’s only fair they have me on some government lists. I support law enforcement and I don’t want them needlessly putting their lives in danger by entering my home in force late one night. I would hate for me to have a misunderstanding of their intentions and take action.

  9. Why do they have to wait 20 years? Financial institutions don’t have to wait that long to destroy documents, and they’ve destroyed more lives than legal gun owners. The IRS only has about six years to audit a return. When I was in college, I worked in the accounting department of a bank that merged with a larger bank. This was before everything was digital. The new bank had me working overtime doing nothing but shredding old documents.

      • That’s fine but we need to establish a standard operating procedure (SOP) amongst FFL(s) that upon 20 yrs. completion those records are shredded if not required to be turned in. We have to cooperate but only to the extent required. Nothing needs to be ease of access or even in existence after 20 years. They get treated lawfully the same as they treat us.

        • That’s all well and fine, but how many FFLs operate continuously for 20 years? I would hazard to say… Not many at all. Sell / close your business? The records have to go to the feds. Even manufacturers, the longest lived licensees on average sometimes don’t last that long. Look at Remington and Marlin / bought up and sold multiple times in that period.

          Say you operate your business for 20 years and then you decide to close up shop and retire. I mean, that’s a solid quarter of a lifetime. 40 years in total will have to pass after your first sale in order to lawfully destroy all the 4473s. You can’t have an FFL without a business license / store front. Are the customers willing to subsidize the owner maintaining those licenses and the storefront for that additional 20 years even though no sales are ongoing–through higher prices? In my experience, not only no but HELL NO. Gun buyers are some of the worst tightwads.

    • All they know is what the 4473 says.

      A great many things can happen over twenty years. Many of that 54 million are dead. Many of those guns have been stolen. I have no doubt that a large number of those people AND those guns are no longer in the country. I’m sure quite a few have been destroy.

      • Because racist communist Eric-the-Hater Holder and racist communist Barry-the-Fairy Soetoro sold those no longer in the country to every nation that now has them via Mexico on Operation Fast & Furious.

    • Then they should know they don’t have the numbers.

      I lived the 12th Street Riot Detroit 1967. They don’t have the numbers.

      Every person to include the military you just fired or discharged is now your enemy.

      Light the fuse!

      I’ll be your huckleberry.

    • He’s more right than wrong. With .gov hoovering up essentially every bit of data on the web they essentially have the analytics of who owns what. Do you think your credit card purchases of cases of ammo from SGammo go unrecorded? No, they don’t.

    • I have seen many firearms in their original boxes along with ammunition bought at the same time that were sold way before records were taken to believe that the government knows where all the guns are. Since these were much more expensive in actual earned money at the time, families hold on to them. Many do not even have serial numbers. I would believe that more than 20% of all weapons have not been fired at all or more than 2 trips to a shooting area.
      They bought their weapon and ammo, it works and it is behind the coats in the closet(or hidden in the pantry or top drawer). That is good enough for them, thank God it has not been needed. Purely a defense buy.

  12. Has the ATF said if they destroy their image database after 20 years from purchase? Also, how many lives has this policy saved?

    • They never destroy their database. I suspect however that their microfilm suffers the effects of age also.

  13. Nothing surprises me about this Marxist regime in Washington now.This is the same thing the Nazis did in Germany and all the current communist countries do to remove gun ownership.We need to double down and support all gun advacy groups.Donate whenever you can.

  14. Every SBR tax stamp record every Suppressor tax stamp record every purchase and or transfer record and we were supposed to believe government would never ever betray Americans?? WTF just how ignorant are we?? This is why we have these things. To ultimately start the battle to defeat the truancy our federal behemoth has become so the sooner we start the better.

    • Do your worst Brandon. I’ve lived a good life. And I’ve got a bunch of armor piercing rounds…

      • This, EXACTLY!
        It’s a far better fate to die on your feet then live on your knees.

        Those who stand for nothing, fall for everything. đŸ€”

  16. We’ve seen enough tyranny in the Brandon Administration to know not to voluntarily surrender guns.

    When they start kicking doors act appropriately.

    Marxists have never been voted out they only leave by force.

    University of Hawaii Study on Democide; Death by Government.

    https://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/

  17. I believe that HNIC Joedolph Biden (Head Nazi In Charge) should be more worried about the military small arms, tanks, bombers, attack jet aircraft, and armed military vehicles that he left over there in Afganistan in the hands of The Taliban and soon to be other Islamic Terrorists, and quit worrying about those who own guns in America.
    If not then he should be impeached for his violations against US citizens, the US Constitution and Bill of Rights, and his failure to secure our borders, while allowing millions of illegals into our country. Otherwise he’s going to touch off The 2nd American Revolution…and it will steamroll his ass.

      • possum,

        No one in their right mind truly wants another revolutionary war. Rather, some people finally get to a point that they need relief.

        Our nation’s trouble is akin to a battered spouse. Some battered spouses eventually reach their limit of constant insults, intimidation, and bruises and take a final stand, winner take all.

  18. By running my license plate any cop can see that among other things, I have a CHP. That would indicate that I have at least one gun. Not that I’m happy that the government keeps all this but our government could F*ck up an anvil. Plus, how many of those 54M records belong to deceased individuals? My dad has been gone a long time but he filled out 4473s in his day.
    Hopefully if anything, this will let those that control the puppets in DC know they’re going to need a bigger force to accomplish the takeover.

    • “……..they’re going to need a bigger force to accomplish the takeover.”

      How many “socialist/social program recipient” illegals are crossing our southern border each day? đŸ€”

    • “Your comment is awaiting moderation”?

      “

..they’re going to need a bigger force to accomplish the takeover.”

      How many ill-eagles are entering each day? đŸ€”

  19. This has been going on a lot longer than Biden has been in power. It’s likely been going on before the Patriot act gave the government legitimacy to do what it has always done.

    Considering how much data the Government has collected and how much it can get from third party businesses it would be safer to assume that they know or can infer who owns firearms, what there political views are and where someone is at any given moment.

    It’s not like the even have to have proof of something to act, even if they are proven wrong in court they just walk away saying my bad and throw tax payers money at the wronged.

    I think a saving grace is that there is too much information for the government to use effectively at least for now.

    • There is more. None of this data, except for recent electronic records, is digitized in the federal record. [This is not to say that some states don’t electronically record transfers, which are not f=prohibited by the federal law.] They are stored on microfilm and the original files disposed of as too voluminous to keep. The government probably has hundreds of millions of records that have to be searched manually–another reason that tracing searches are typically useless. If any transaction from the manufacturer to the crime scene was a private sale, or was a stolen firearm, a trace is unable to determine who possessed a firearm when it seized at a crime scene without finger prints.

  20. The old Right Wing paranoia about registration only shows their own stupidity. If the government would outlaw or restrict a certain class of weapons one could not sell one without the risk of going to jail and being fined and losing ones job. One could not shoot it at a public range. One could not use it in a self-defense situation without being caught and jailed. If caught one would be banned from owing all firearms for life.

    So does it matter that the government is recording some of the 4473 forms. No it does not. Gun dealers are not even required to turn in their records after they are 20 years old. Some that are turned in have suffered water damage and other forms of storage damage and may even be unreadable.

    • Registration works. Ask Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini, Mao, Pol Pot, and a dozen other socialist sonsabeaches.

      • dacien_reformed November 7, 2021 At 12:51
        Registration works. Ask Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini, Mao, Pol Pot, and a dozen other socialist sonsabeaches.
        ……………………………………………………………………………
        They are dead… We ain’t….

    • Gosh, dacian the dim, you say that like you think it’s a GOOD thing. But of course you would, because you’re a Leftist/authoritarian/fascist clown. First, you are factually, objectively, wrong. The gummint can’t control private transfers of firearms . . . period. It can try (as it has) and fail miserably (as they do), but success at that will elude them just as much as success at regulating illegal narcotics, or illegal immigrants.

      “Government” can’t competently organize a one-car parade, as all rational people know (and as our oh-so-competent government proves on the daily). But you are ALL ABOUT surrendering your individual sovereignty to a bunch of nitwits with government jobs, largely because you consider yourself one of the “smart folks” (pro tip: you’re NOT), and you figure you’ll be in charge. You won’t. You’ll continue sucking the government teat, as you always have, and pretending to competence. But you’ll continue to provide entertainment for folks rational enough to recognize your pathetic delusions and incompetence. The right thread of this site, and we get the dacian the idiot minstrel show, for free. Free laughs are hard to come by.

      Keep being clueless, and I can save money on tickets to stupid woke movies.

  21. During WWII the Nazi’s told the people you will comply “or else” and everyone knew what “or else” meant. The Nazi’s were not doing anything new as this is the standard way of staying in power from the dawn of civilization.

    Remember George Washington, long before there were any Nazi’s executed some of his own rebellious people, something the Far Right conveniently swept under the rug.

    • Yep, you’re right about the Nazis. What you fail to understand is, the Nazis were National SOCIALISTS, not so different from Stalin, Mao, etc etc.

    • Whoa. dacian the dim actually understands that governments (ALL governments) tend to authoritarianism and control of individual liberty?? Question would be, why are you such an authoritarian/Leftist sycophant???

  22. The liquidation of an entire American Black business district that killed hundreds of innocent black businessmen and millions of American Indians earlier in time was also studied by Hitler and the Nazi’s. The Americans taught the Nazi’s that they could get away with mass murder too.

    So the next time some ignorant loud mouth far right nut case screams resistance, revolution or non-compliance remind him of what happed to David Koresh and his followers who’s church was not BATF approved and had broken gun laws. They were Waco’d and incinerated with a flame thrower tank. Or remind them of Ruby Ridge where a man’s pregnant wife was gunned down on her doorstep with her baby in her arms and the sniper got a promotion and a raise. This is reality and only fools from the Far Right would claim that it would not happen to them.

    No matter what country we are speaking about the people in power want and usually have absolute power over the proletariat. History has proven it many times over in the past. Your imagined God Given rights are just that, imagined. There are no God given rights because the Holy Ghost took the last train for the coast ( a famous line from the song “Bye, Bye, American Pie”). Your rights are doled out sparingly by your lords and masters, the assholes that are in power. That is reality, like it or not.

      • Staying too long in the basement has resulted in delusions about the real world and his place in it.

    • And, your “fix” for all of America’s sins is, what, exactly? We become another communistic socialist shiphole country?

    • Your last 2 paragraphs sound awfully right wing Dacian.

      If you’re worried about the government steam rolling you into submission, why would you vote to expand governmental powers?

      Sounds like you would vote to restrict government overreach? Maybe get rid of some worthless governmental agencies (BATFE I’m looking at you) or would you vote to expand?

      • He wants to work for one of the lettered agencies enforcing the “will of the people” on to the people.

    • The vast majority of American Indians died as a result of diseases imported from Europe by early explorers and settlers, not by a intentional program of genocide. (I am not saying that that did not happen–the Trail of Tears was a genocide.) Indians had never been exposed to, and as a result had no natural immunity to the plagues and fevers which Europeans had centuries earlier developed immunity. Infected Indians carried these diseases to other communities that never had contact with Europeans, wiping out whole cultures before the whites ventured that far west (or north from Mexico).

    • Well douchian,
      Waco and ruby ridge only happened the way they did because the branch davidians and the weavers decided not to fight back. I promise, it will be different if it happens in my town.

      • As you well know, the Bundy standoff did not end like Ruby Ridge or Waco.
        Why seems pretty obvious.

  23. The GCA of 1968 requires dealers to maintain completed F4473’s for 20 years. However, they must maintain their bound log books for as long as they maintain their FFL. So yes you can do a ATF trace on a new gun purchased 20+ years ago. There is a proposed ATF “ruling” to require dealers to maintain all F4473 records while still in business contrary to federal law passed by Congress in 1968. For some very large volume dealers the burden, cost and space of storing tens or hundreds of thousands of paper records & bound books can be too high. It’s easier to apply for a brand new or different type of FFL and give your pallets of old records to the ATF and start over.

  24. Yes history has shown that the people do comply with the law when there future is in jeopardy if they do not obey the laws.

  25. “The Biden administration in just the past year alone stockpiled the records of more than 54 million U.S. gun owners …

    The ATF obtained 53.8 million paper records and another 887,000 electronic records …”

    53.8 million paper records and another 887,000 electronic records. That’s a lot of firearms, not necessarily that number of people. Some of those records could be multiple purchases by the same person so assuming it represents “more than 54 million U.S. gun owners” might not be correct. Its like those “how many gun owner things” you see in stats sometimes where it says there are X number of firearms assuming its one firearm per owner.

    It would have been more correct to say …

    “The Biden administration in just the past year alone stockpiled the records of more than 54 million guns purchased by U.S. gun owners…”

  27. Up until about two years ago I could have sold all mine at garage sales…..Then we got a liberal Governator!

  28. Only58million? C’mon guys you’re not even trying! Make a law that the running tally must be kept public. The day the total EXCEEDS 1/2 America’s population, beers on me!

    • It is probably over half the country already

      there are over 350 million guns in the U.S. in gun ownership.

      38 states report at least 40% or more of their citizens are gun owners with the highest Montana at 66.30% of its population….

      12 states – Florida, Delaware, Maryland, California, Illinois, Connecticut, New York, Hawaii, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New Jersey – report ownership below 40% of their populations respectively with New Jersey & Massachusetts in a tie for the lowest at 14.7%

      get the calculation out, do the math.

      • in 2020 it was 35% – 40% of the U.S. that were gun owners. Sales since then have increased, including per-to-person sale. The numbers from the states this year (above) take that to about 50%, and with the estimated person-to-person sales to almost 60%.

        The pandemic sold a lot of guns, the increase in crime sold a lot of guns. BLM sold a lot of guns, Jan 6th sold a lot of guns, Biden sold a lot of guns, shortages sold a lot of guns, the general increase in lawlessness sold a lot of guns.

        You owe us a beer. 🙂

        • now you know why Biden wants to disarm us, he is afraid.

          Jan 6th scared the hell out of him especially that attitude displayed by one guy that said they should have bought the guns with them to the tune of 30,000 but next time they will bring them. Now, I don’t know if he could muster up 30,000 guns or not, but the idea of a armed revolt starting at the capital building scared the hell out of the democrats and Biden.

          “When government fears the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny.”

          The people are tired of being in fear, the pandemic saw to that.

        • The recent interview with the CEO of Atlas Survival Shelters suggests that a lot more people at the top than just Biden are starting to freak out, like really freak out.

          “The R word” comes up.

  29. Between ID’ing gun owners and the unvaccinated it seems like the sides are being well defined.

  30. That’s all fine and dandy, now if they could just figure out how many boolits we have.
    I believe back in 1994 Clinton was going to ban citizens from wearing camouflage clothing.

    • well, he wanted to make sure he could see the women and them being able to blend in with the flora and fauna made it difficult.

  31. Brandon doesn’t have the capacity to actually pursue confiscation. Hell, he can’t even mandate the jab when people get it at no cost to them. Confiscate hundreds or thousands of dollars of gear from hundreds of millions of citizens? Oh Hell no!

  33. I wonder if this includes the firearms the ATF walked to the Mexican cartels and the Islamic terrorists in the Paris attack as a result of Operation Fast and Furious.

  34. It’s been a given that the gubmint has data on gun owners going back many years. The upside is, being the gubmint, they likely will never figure out how to collate it or utilize it. But, now that they are married to Big Tech, this may change.

  35. For all the repeated mention of the Biden administration, it seems some folks don’t realize the fact that fiscal year 2021 started under the Trump administration:

    “FY 2021 is between Oct. 1, 2020 and Sept. 30, 202“

    And the trump ministration was also the instigator of the pistol brace ban process, as well as the outright ban on bump stocks pushed through by the Trump administration ATF appointee.

    “We should take the guns first, and worry about the courts later”
    Donald J. Trump

    But go ahead, engage in your delusions
 so when is JFK Junior returning again?

    • Look at the trained sea lion folks. He’s trying to convince us that his fascist masters in the left are not going to try to take our guns away.

      What a maroon.

      • I’m a troll jwm.

        I don’t make much sense, I kinda know that, but I enjoy being a clown.

        The funny party is when someone takes me seriously.

        For me the world revolves around one man…TRUMP.

    • Neither jay bird nor Fake Miner can refute the facts I post, so they use their typical tactic of personal attacks.

      Perhaps you could mention a republican president that has expanded gun rights as the Obama/Biden Administration did by signing into law the CARD act of 2009 that opened millions of acres of public land to the carrying of firearms.

      ‘insert crickets sound sample here‘

  37. In this threadDan Zimmerman discovers that ATF has been collecting out of business records from gun dealers. And……..its Biden’s fault.

    Something that started in 19effing68……….yeah, fifty three years this has been going on.

    That there is some awesome journalism I tell ya!

  38. “there are over 350 million guns in the U.S.”

    pretty sure .95 of them are owned by the same .1 of the population. if one guy owns a hundred guns then that means at least .9 of them are irrelevant.

    ‘cept in some circumstances. knew a guy who said he had 350 guns. I ask him why, he only had two hands, and he just smirked. realized later he was his synagogue’s armorer.

  40. “that guy November 12, 2021 At 10:27

    That’s all well and fine, but how many FFLs operate continuously for 20 years? I would hazard to say
 Not many at all.”

    WRONG 
. (đŸ˜đŸ€©đŸ€ŁđŸ˜…đŸ˜‚đŸ˜†)

    Many FFL(s) here in Texas have been in business for more than 20 years. Even in small towns they’re in business as an FFL for much longer than 20 years. Your point of argument doesn’t apply as you can still shred those that are 20 years old. Closing after 30 years? Simply remand those records over that are less than 20 years of age.

    I don’t care what you’d do with yours. Mine would go as soon as they were able to be.

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