Wachovia, BofA Notify Customers of Breach

Wachovia Corp. and Bank of America Corp. are notifying thousands of customers that their accounts may have been breached in a theft of financial records from four banks.

The theft was exposed last month when police in Hackensack, N.J., charged nine people, including a business owner, a New Jersey state worker and seven bank employees, in a plot to steal financial records of thousands of customers, which were then sold to collection agencies.

The employees charged in the plot obtained records for customers of Cherry Hill, N.J.-based Commerce Bank, PNC Bank of Pittsburgh and Charlotte, N.C.-based Wachovia and Bank of America.