In defense of EE's decision against offering an unlimited data plan on 4G, Olaf Swantee - CEO of EE; the only carrier currently providing the high-speed 4G network in the UK - said in a speech at the Mobile World Congress that an average UK user consumes a total of just about 1.4GB data per month; thereby making an unlimited data tariff "unnecessary" on 4G.

The argument put forth by Swantee comes in the wake of the criticism which EE has been facing after the launch of its 4G service with a 500MB plan, costing £31 per month. Some industry watchers and experts lashed out against EE's decision on the grounds that the increased speeds witnessed by 4G users would lead most of them to exceed their data limit, without their realizing it.

However, defending its decision, EE asserted that, with the monthly average of the users being 1.4GB, it was highly unlikely that users will require any more than that.

Swantee also disclosed that, so far as the data usage of EE's 4G customers was concerned, 25 percent of all 4G traffic is for video; and approximately 11 percent is for YouTube video-sharing site alone.

Furthermore, Swantee also claimed that the average speed of EE's 4G network was 16mbps, with the peak speeds being 50mbps, which is almost at par with some home broadband packages.