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The peer-to-peer television service, which was launched at the end of last month, could place even greater strain on Britain's broadband network if it proves to be popular with even a fraction of licence-fee payers.

Many ISPs have already introducing traffic shaping technology to reduce the bandwidth burden at peak times. Now, leading providers are threatening to choke the bandwidth available to the

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iPlayer, unless the BBC contributes to the costs of distribution, according to The Independent.

A spokeswoman for Tiscali told the newspaper: "The potential for iPlayer to suck up capacity is a concern and we need a better dialogue with the BBC about that."

The Independent also quoted a "senior BBC insider" as saying: "It is certainly a live debate between ISPs [internet service providers] and the BBC. If the BBC gets the numbers it wants for iPlayer then network capacity could become an issue."

The threat of bandwidth throttling is bad news for the iPlayer, which is already struggling with download times. PC Pro's trials have found that it can often take two or three hours to download a 30 minute programme.

The iPlayer is currently only available to selected viewers on a limited beta basis, but will be made available to everyone in the UK over the course of the year.