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The network, which holds the iPhone exclusive in France, was met with a barrage of protest from users of the Apple handset, who noticed they were receiving far slower than advertised speeds.

Orange admitted that it was deliberately capping the speeds to "preserve the stability of the network", according to a

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report on Apple Insider.

However, the network claims that it will boost speeds to 1Mb/sec by the middle of next month - which is still only a fraction of the 7.2Mb/sec potential of HSPDA connections.

Interestingly, Orange was the slowest performer in PC Pro's recent test of mobile broadband dongles, recording an average connection speed in London of 650Kb/sec, which was more than three times slower than the top performing network, T-Mobile.

A spokesman for Orange in the UK was unable to confirm whether the network was also applying caps in this country at the time of publication.