The original specification for the File Transfer Protocol (FTP) was written by Abhay Bhushan who was at the time a student at IIT-Kanpur. FTP was first published as RFC 114. Until 1980, FTP ran on NCP, the predecessor of TCP/IP. The protocol was later replaced by a TCP/IP version, RFC 765.
FTP that is built on a client-server architecture and can run in active or passive mode, is a standard network protocol used to transfer files from one host to another over a TCP-based network, such as the internet.
FTP users may authenticate themselves using a clear-text sign-in protocol or anonymously if the server allows it.
The first FTP client applications were command-line applications developed before operating systems had graphical user interfaces, and are still shipped with most Windows, Unix, and Linux operating systems. FTP has been used by hundreds of productivity applications.