Orange has moved to defend itself ahead of its launch of the popular iPhone tomorrow after online commentators accused the operator of inhibiting use of the handset by placing a limit on the number of downloads that subscribers can make via its network.

The network operator has attracted substantial criticism, since it revealed its pricing structure last week, from potential customers put off by a 750MB “cap” on the number of downloads that can be made via the iPhone using its network.

Most of the criticism has come online via blogs and Twitter who lambasted the company for advertising “unlimited” downloads despite putting restrictions on usage.

Orange has moved to defend its policy by arguing that the average iPhone subscribe is highly unlikely to use anything like 750MB of capacity via a 3G network.

Paul Jevons, director of portals, products and services for Orange UK, said: “This is not a cap, it is a very generous fair usage policy. The vast majority of customers will be completely unaffected by this.”

He said the fair usage policy is designed to ensure that its network performance is not inhibited by customers clogging up its 3G network by streaming copious amounts of video or music.

“The risk is that a minority of people will abuse the market and spoil the experience for the majority,” he said.

On top of the 750MB of usage via 3G networks, Orange will also provide 750MB via public wi-fi networks and will not limit usage via private wi-fi networks within a customer’s residence.

Orange already sells the iPhone in a number of other markets and argues that the average subscriber only uses 200MB of capacity. An Orange spokesman said: “Our experience of offering the iPhone across 28 countries, has shown that the allocation of 750MB of mobile data usage allowance, proves more than ample for the vast majority of iPhone customers.”

The fair usage policy allows for about 5 hours of video downloaded from YouTube, 75,000 mobile web pages or 30,000 normal web pages according to the company. Alternatively, it would equate to 250 full music tracks or 1,500 mobile games.

Mr Jevons said that the operator is not planning to cut off customers that breach the fair usage limit but will slow down the connection for heavy users “in extreme cases”.

The criticism of the fair usage policy follows disappointment among many prospective customers that the operator has not kicked off a price war against O2 to reduce the price of owning an iPhone.

However, the cap does reflect that the company is keen to avoid the network problems that have plagued O2 over recent months as users of the iPhone have clogged its network. “Our tariff management policies are designed to ensure that the typical multimedia user has a fast, reliable connection,” the spokesman said.

Orange has also been forced to defend itself against accusations that it would ban access to sites like YouTube after the terms and conditions published online said that it reserved the right to block “non-Orange streaming services”.

The company said that it would not block access to popular sites and is amending its terms and conditions ahead of the launch tomorrow.

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