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    Isn't mtime itself metadata? Thus if mtime is modified as result of data being modified, metadata is modified, therefore resulting in setting ctime to the time when that metadata modification (setting of mtime) occurred. At least that would be my interpretation; I have no idea if that is the official one. Commented Aug 24, 2015 at 19:38
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    @celtschk, with that reasoning, the ctime would also be updated every time the file is read (as atime, also a metadata in the inode, is modified). Commented Aug 24, 2015 at 20:23