USA providers close gap between advertised and actual broadband speeds

By Susan

August

24

2011

Recent investigations have shown that the gap between advertised and actual broadband speeds by Internet Service Providers in the USA has been closing over the past couple of years.

Recent figures have been released in the United States suggesting that Internet Service Providers in America have been closing the gap between advertised broadband speeds and actual broadband speeds over the past couple of years. The results of the national study have been released by the Federal Communications Commission.

According to the study results most Internet Service Providers in the United States are now within eighty percent of their advertised speeds, which officials have said reflects a huge improvement compared to two years ago. As part of the study the FCC studied thirteen leading providers in the United States, which included cable, DSL and fiber-to-the-home services.

FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski recently revealed the results of the study at a Best Buy Co store, stating: “Most major ISPs are providing service close to what they’re advertising. This represents a significant improvement over the findings from two years ago when we first shined a light on this issue.”

Richard Bennett, a senior official at the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, said: “This report pretty well dispels the myth … that there’s a huge gap between advertised and actual speeds, and in fact we do pretty well here in the United States.”

However, not all providers were praised for their results. One official said: “This study indicates Comcast, Cox and Verizon FiOS largely perform well, but other companies like Cablevision, AT&T, MediaCom and Frontier all fail to deliver their customers the quality of service promised.”

Source – Reuters