Data transfer was cut short for state (4)
I believe the answer is:
iowa
'for state' is the definition.
(Iowa is an example)
'data transfer was cut short' is the wordplay.
'data transfer' becomes 'io' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'cut short' means to remove the last letter.
'was' with its last letter taken away is 'wa'.
'io'+'wa'='IOWA'
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for iowa that I've seen before include "US swing electoral state" , "Central US state" , "State of USA" , "part of United States" , "part of US" .)