Another day, another big-name company gets a ticking-off from the guardians of advertising decency.

Step forward Vodafone, which has been told not to use "explicit and gratuitous" images to flog mobile services.

Another ad bearing the same caption featured a partly clothed couple on the bonnet of a car with the woman straddling the man.

People had complained on the grounds that the ads were "sexually gratuitous, unsuitable to be seen by children and likely to cause serious and widespread offence".

Vodafone denied this claiming that research had found that a large number of young people used text messages to "enhance their love lives". They claimed the ads merely reflected the real mobile behaviour of younger people.

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) disagreed and asked Vodafone not to repeat this approach in future. ®