It uses a decentralized distributed data store to keep and deliver information, and has a suite of free software for publishing and communicating on the Web without fear of censorship.

[8][9][10] The distributed data store of Freenet is used by many third-party programs and plugins to provide microblogging and media sharing,[11] anonymous and decentralised version tracking,[12] blogging,[13] a generic web of trust for decentralized spam resistance,[14][15] Shoeshop for using Freenet over sneakernet,[16] and many more.

The origin of Freenet can be traced to Ian Clarke's student project at the University of Edinburgh, which he completed as a graduation requirement in the summer of 1999.

[17][18][19] Ian Clarke's resulting unpublished report "A distributed decentralized information storage and retrieval system" (1999) provided foundation for the seminal paper written in collaboration with other researchers, "Freenet: A Distributed Anonymous Information Storage and Retrieval System" (2001).

This is similar to how routers on the Internet route packets without knowing anything about files‍— except Freenet has caching, a layer of strong encryption, and no reliance on centralized structures.

The transport layer created for the darknet mode allows communication over restricted routes as commonly found in mesh networks, as long as these connections follow a small-world structure.

[25] As of build 1226, released on 30 July 2009, features that have been written include significant security improvements against both attackers acting on the network and physical seizure of the computer running the node.

[26] As of build 1468, released on 11 July 2015, the Freenet core stopped using the db4o database and laid the foundation for an efficient interface to the Web of Trust plugin which provides spam resistance.

This problem was solved by making Freenet compatible with OpenJDK, a free and open source implementation of the Java Platform.

The simplest is via FProxy, which is integrated with the node software and provides a web interface to content on the network.

Using FProxy, a user can browse freesites (websites that use normal HTML and related tools, but whose content is stored within Freenet rather than on a traditional web server).

Every node on the Freenet network contributes storage space to hold files and bandwidth that it uses to route requests from its peers.

With darknet, users connect only to "friends" with whom they previously exchanged public keys, named node-references.

[33][citation needed] The Freenet file sharing network stores documents and allows them to be retrieved later by an associated key, as is now possible with protocols such as HTTP.

The system has no central servers and is not subject to the control of any one individual or organization, including the designers of Freenet.

When asked about the topic, Freenet developers defer to the EFF discussion which says that not being able to filter anything is a safe choice.

[35][36] Like Winny, Share and Perfect Dark, Freenet not only transmits data between nodes but actually stores them, working as a huge distributed cache.

Due to Freenet's anonymous nature the original publishing node or owner of any piece of data is unknown.

This is unlike most other P2P networks where node administrators can employ a ratio system, where users have to share a certain amount of content before they can download.

[38] The result is that the network will self-organize into a distributed, clustered structure where nodes tend to hold data items that are close together in key space.

It carries all the binary data building blocks for the content to be delivered to the client for reassembly and decryption.

SSKs can be used to establish a verifiable pseudonymous identity on Freenet, and allow for multiple documents to be inserted securely by a single person.

Furthermore, the security features inherent to Freenet make detailed performance analysis (including things as simple as determining the size of the network) difficult to do accurately.

[46] The core innovation in Freenet 0.7 is to allow a globally scalable darknet, capable (at least in theory) of supporting millions of users.

The scalability of Freenet is made possible by the fact that human relationships tend to form small-world networks, a property that can be exploited to find short paths between any two people.

The work is based on a speech given at DEF CON 13 by Ian Clarke and Swedish mathematician Oskar Sandberg.

[47] Freenet Messaging System (FMS) Frost Sone jSite Infocalypse FCPLib lib-pyFreenet Law enforcement agencies have claimed to have successfully infiltrated Freenet opennet in order to deanonymize users[54] but no technical details have been given to support these allegations.

One report stated that, "A child-porn investigation focused on ... [the suspect] when the authorities were monitoring the online network, Freenet.

[58] The court decision indicates that a Canadian Law Enforcement agency operates nodes running modified Freenet software in the hope of determining who is requesting illegal material.

Freenet has had significant publicity in the mainstream press, including articles in The New York Times, and coverage on CNN, 60 Minutes II, the BBC, The Guardian,[9] and elsewhere.