[3] The main goals of Freifunk are to build a large-scale free wireless Wi-Fi network that is decentralized, owned by those who run it and to support local communication.

One of the results of the BerLon workshop in October 2002 on free wireless community networks in Berlin and London was the Picopeering Agreement.

During the workshop, participants also agreed upon regular meetings in Berlin to build their own free wifi network.

The project fights secondary liability: Secondary liability is the legal situation that makes the owners of open / non-encrypted wireless access points liable for what other users do over their internet connection (i.e. guilty until proven innocent), as outlined in the Störerhaftung [de] law, part of the Telemediengesetz [de] Act as last ratified in 2007.

This legal practice led to fear and uncertainty and made many people and businesses close their Internet and Wi-Fi access points, e.g. in cafés or in public locations.

The Freifunk Freedom Fighter Box was a preconfigured access point that sent all data from the public network to Sweden over a VPN connection.

[11] The situation regarding secondary liability was only clarified in 2016–18 as a result of several legal rulings by the European Court of Justice (ECJ),[12] and the Bundesgerichtshof[13][14] which drastically restricted the scope of secondary liability in Germany and therefore made it legally feasible to put up public Wi-Fi hotspots in Germany again.