US Patent 11928030 Optimize backup from universal share

A method includes creating a deduplicated universal share (US) of data objects, which in turn includes receiving a US of the data objects, deduplicating the US, wherein deduplicating the US includes: hashing segments of the US to generate respective US segment fingerprints; comparing US segment fingerprints to fingerprints for respective segments held in deduplication storage in order to identify segments in the deduplication storage that equate to the US segments, respectively, of the US; storing identifiers that directly or indirectly identify locations, respectively, of the segments, respectively, in the deduplication storage that equate to the US segments, respectively, of the US. After creating the deduplicated universal share, a deduplicated backup of the US is created without reassembling the US from segments held in the deduplication storage, the creating the deduplicated backup including: creating a list that comprises copies of the stored identifiers, and storing the list.