The Multicast backbone (MBone) is used to multicast network traffic over an IP network. MBone is primarily designed to multicast audio and video signals over the Internet. It required special hardware and software.

In 1990, MBone was used as an experiment for network multicasting traffic. Its primary uses include audio and video streaming for TV channels and video conferencing. In 1994, MBone was first used as a multicast backbone for transmission of a musical concert. In 1995, Russia used an MBone multicast link in a sound research laboratory.