UK broadband connections have been ranked 31st in a poll of 66 countries, highlighting issues that may plague small businesses in IT.

The poll, carried out by Cisco, discovered that the top two places were held by the Far East segment of South Korea and Japan respectively, while the UK could not break into the top 20.

Speaking to the BBC this week, Joanne Hughes, Cisco's communication manager, explained: "We forecast the UK will improve because of things such as cable networks being upgraded and the Digital Britain report focusing on next generation access."

The average global download speed recorded in the poll is 4.75Mbps and the typical upload speed is currently 1.3Mbps.

Sweden is also able to boast having the best roll-out of broadband access, with rural areas in particular being billed as great areas to use the internet.

Earlier this week, TalkTalk announced that it is to reveal plans on applying a film-style classification system to broadband connections in order to help parents keep children safe online.

According to a recent survey by Connect, the two biggest IT headaches for businesses were 'everyday hassles with IT' (37 per cent) and 'security concerns' (32 per cent).