Here's a bit of bad news for those who bought their new Nokia N95s from Orange and Vodafone in the UK. According to IT News, both operators have decided to disable the new handset's built-in VoIP feature.

IT News also reports that a Nokia spokeswoman told vnunet.com that Orange specifically asked for the N95's VoIP feature to be switched off. "This a handset-specific issue," she said. "In this particular instance Orange was asked by Nokia whether they wanted the functionality switched on or off, and Orange selected off."

Vodafone, meanwhile, said in a statement that they don't offer VoIP services because "the technology is not yet mature." The company noted that internet telephony requires "in-depth testing, a solid end-to-end customer experience, billing integration and customer service support which is not currently available".

Internet telephony firm Truphone, however, had another explanation. Truphone claimed that the move by both operators was made in order to protect themselves from the rapidly-growing threat from VoIP services, which can provide cheaper calls over data networks such as WiFi.