As the value of access to digital services and platforms continues to grow, bridging the digital divide has become an increasingly pressing problem for governments. Traditional network operators have gone a long way in making the internet accessible to much of the world. However, their business models have stalled when it comes to providing access to those for whom commercial services are either too expensive or inaccessible, or both. As a communications technology, WiFi has a variety of advantages over other access technologies, making it an attractive choice for the provision of affordable access.
The deployment of publicly accessible WiFi hotspots that are free or mostly free to use has emerged in the last 10 to 12 years as a relatively low-cost means for governments to take steps to address the digital divide. As a result, there have been a significant number of these initiatives, both in developed and global South countries.
This report examines 60 free and public WiFi initiatives in 25 selected countries in Africa, Asia and the Pacific. Across the countries profiled, there are public WiFi initiatives with tens to hundreds of thousands of access points in developing and developed economies. These projects show us that it’s possible to build national-scale free public WiFi. Heeding the lessons learned across both successes and failures could be key to the successful planning of the next major free public WiFi network.
Read the full paper here.
This publication is part of the Local Networks initiative, a collective effort led by APC and Rhizomatica in partnership with grassroots communities and support organisations in Africa, Asia and Latin America and the Caribbean. Its production is part of the project “Supporting Community-led Approaches to Addressing the Digital Divide” supported by the UK Government’s Digital Access Programme.