FourCC
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FourCC
A FourCC (literally, four-character code) is a sequence of four bytes used to uniquely identify data formats.
The concept originated in the OSType scheme used in the Macintosh system software and was adopted for the Amiga/Electronic Arts Interchange File Format and derivatives. The idea was later reused to identify compressed data types inQuickTime and DirectShow.