Freenet 0.7 alpha Now Available for Public Testing

The first alpha version of Freenet 0.7, a peer-to-peer network  
designed to allow the free sharing of information over the Internet,  
is now ready for public testing.

Freenet 0.7 represents a major new approach to peer-to-peer network  
design. To protect the network, and the user's anonymity, Freenet  
users will now have the ability to connect directly to other people  
that they know and trust, together forming a "global darknet" making  
it extremely difficult for any third party, whether a government or  
another powerful organisation, to determine that a user is  
participating in Freenet, let alone what they are doing with it. This  
new version is a complete rewrite of the Freenet software,  
representing numerous other improvements, including:

     * Freenet now operates over UDP rather than TCP
     * Freenet can transparently operate through firewalls
     * Freenet's core architecture and algorithm has been redesigned  
for simplicity and efficiency
     * A new and even simpler API allowing the rapid development of  
third party software that interacts with Freenet

The new Freenet employs a simpler and more flexible routing model  
than previous versions, which in the future may allow diverse  
applications ranging from efficient search, to near-real time instant  
messaging and chat between anonymous participants. Initially Freenet  
0.7 will be a "pure darknet" model, in that all connections must be  
trusted, however future versions will permit a mixed opennet/darknet  
approach where the user can opt to allow untrusted connections to  
their node, which will improve connectivity and convenience at the  
expense of security.

Note that this release is still a very early alpha; users should  
neither expect it to be secure, nor user friendly. Rather, the  
purpose of this release is to facilitate wider testing, to inform  
people of the progress we have made, and to attract fresh development  
talent, both to Freenet itself, and to third party applications that  
use Freenet as a platform.

This release would not have been possible without the work of  
numerous volunteers, and Matthew Toseland, Freenet's full time  
developer. Matthew's work is funded through donations via our  
website, we ask that anyone who can help us to ensure Matthew's  
continued employment by visiting our donations page and making a  
contribution at:

    http://freenetproject.org/index.php?page=donate

The new version of Freenet may be downloaded from:

    http://freenetproject.org/index.php?page=download-new

Kind regards,

Ian Clarke.
Freenet Project Coordinator.