Lot’s of towns have areas where there is free-wifi access; coastal towns have it on the beaches, for example. Frigiliana has gone further.

Very shortly you will have free-wifi access in the whole of the village, including most streets and public buildings.

This is thanks to a European project that includes 223 Spanish towns, 40 of which are in Andalucía. Frigiliana is the only one in the province of Málaga to be chosen for the WiFi4EU, as it is known.

The Town Hall has already received 15,000 euros from European funds which will be used to set up the wifi points – there will be at least ten set up in the next 18 months. The first one set up will be the Tourist Information Office.

On a national level Spain will received 3.36m euros as a first instalment of the 42m budget for this purpose. In exchange the municipalities chosen pledge to meet the maintenance costs, pay the service provider and keep the wifi network operative for at least three years.

The EU’s WiFi4EU Project intends to provide 8,000 municipalities with at leasts a 30-mbs connection – they received tens of thousands of requests from municipalities across the Union.

The wifi points will not be used to gather user data and will be established in places of public interest, such as parks, libraries, museums, public squares, amongst other locations.

(News: Frigiliana, Axarquia, Costa del Sol, Malaga, Andalucia)