New broadband guidelines 'a positive step' for the industry

New broadband guidelines from the Committees of Advertising Practice (CAP) have been hailed as a step forward for the industry.

Commenting on the recent release of the regulations, Michael Phillips of Broadbandchoices.co.uk, praised them as a good way of clamping down on "optimistic" or "unrealistic" claims about connections speeds.

He cited figures from his firm's customer complaints survey, which indicated many companies had failed to live up to expectations about broadband performance.

Mr Phillips went on to highlight the vital role that CAP has to play in regulating internet connection advertisements.

"It's crucial that CAP ensures that any caveats or terminology used by advertisers are simple to understand - contention ratios and signal attenuation will mean nothing to my mother when she's considering switching services," he said.

A recent Pando Networks download speed study found that in more than 200 countries around the world, the average is 580 kilobytes per second.