the invention disclosed herein includes a system and method for electronically transferring data through a communications connection in a transparent manner such that the data transfer does not interfere with other traffic sharing the connection . the invention transfers data using bandwidth of the connection that other traffic are not using . if other traffic desires to use the bandwidth currently being used by the invention , the invention relinquishes the bandwidth to the other traffic and retreats to avoid bandwidth contention . although a retreat may cause gaps in the data transferred , a key aspect of the invention is that any missing data due to these gaps is recovered easily and in a bandwidth - efficient way using novel error correction and recovery .