In Brief: Hacking Spurs Sovereign to Reissue Cards.(Sovereign Bancorp)(Brief Article)

Sovereign Bancorp Inc. is reissuing 83,000 Visa debit cards following a hacking of Internet merchant Web sites, the Philadelphia company confirmed Wednesday.

Dick Ehst, a spokesman for Sovereign, but said his company was not the only card issuer affected by the breach. "Many banks and credit card companies" were hit.

Because of a law enforcement investigation, he would not give further details about the incident, including the identities of the merchants that were hacked.

Reissuing the cards will cost Sovereign $500,000, Mr. Ehst said. "The decision to reissue cards was easy to make. Unfortunately the time it took" to identify the accounts and the cost to replace them will take a toll. At least 700 Sovereign accounts were compromised.

Sovereign, which has issued 1.2 million Visa check cards, notified cardholders of the breach May 18. It hopes to complete the reissuance by June 9 at the latest.

"We're certainly considering all options at this point" in recouping the costs, whether through Visa U.S.A., the merchants involved, or elsewhere, Mr. Ehst said.

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