Connecting broadband voice and data signals to telephone systems

A system for use in connecting broadband voice and data signals to communications systems such as the telephone system. Due to the low pass filtering characteristics of a standard twisted pair used in conventional telephone access loops data band signals are attenuated more than voice band signals. As shown, in an interface arrangement 100 for bidirectional communication over a common medium 131, 132 (such as a twisted pair which has frequency dependent matching requirements and transmission effects), the effects of transmitted voice band and data band signals on the receive path are cancelled by subtracting from the received signals separately generated voice and data band return signals (echo estimates). The return signals are generated by voice and data band return loss circuits 114 and 117 each connected to a respective filter 113, 116 to restrict its effect to its own band.