MD5 checksums are used to establish the integrity of internet downloads. Using the provided MD5SUMS file gives you more confidence in knowing the file you've downloaded is the same as file we published. The Download Validation File (MD5SUMS) contains a list of the ITIS download files and their MD5 checksums. To use it, you must get the "Download Validation File" as well as the database file you've chosen. You can then verify whether your download was successful by determining the MD5 checksum for your downloaded file and comparing it to the checksum in the Download Validation File. For Linux To determine the MD5 checksum for your downloaded file, open a command prompt and enter: md5sum your-downloaded-file Compare your downloaded file's MD5 checksum with the MD5 checksum listed in the Download Validation File (MD5SUMS). If they are the same then the download was successful. For Windows 1. Open Powershell 2. Type Get-FileHash -Algorithm MD5. For example Get-FileHash C:\Users\Darwin\downloads\itisMSSql.zip -Algorithm MD5 3. Check that the value returned matches the value the MD5 file you downloaded from the ITIS website (and opened in Notepad). If you should have difficulty determining your MD5 checksum for your downloaded file, then contact us at the ITIS Webmaster email address: itiswebmaster@itis.gov