January 11, 2006

PEOPLE'S BANK INFORMS PERSONAL CREDIT LINE CUSTOMERS OF LOST TAPE CONTAINING CONFIDENTIAL INFORMATION

Tape Lost During Transport by UPS;No Sign of Data Misuse;Customer Accounts Secure

BRIDGEPORT - People's Bank is notifying approximately 90,000 affected customers that a tape containing confidential data was lost recently while being transported by UPS to TransUnion, a credit reporting bureau. The tape contains personal information about customers, including bank employees, who have a People's Bank personal credit line (PCL), the "overdraft protection" associated with their personal checking account. This incident does not affect equity credit lines or any other People's accounts.

People's has no reason to believe that the data has been used inappropriately and has not received any reports of unauthorized activity. The computer tape cannot be read without sophisticated mainframe equipment and software.

The information on the missing tape is not sufficient to allow unauthorized access to customers' accounts at People's and there is no need for customers to close any accounts to safeguard their security. The missing tape contains information about PCL accounts such as names, addresses, social security and checking account numbers. It does not contain information on checking account balances, debit card numbers, personal identification numbers (PINs) or birth dates.

"Our customers' privacy is of the utmost importance to us and we take our responsibility to safeguard personal information very seriously," said Bryan Huebner, executive vice president, Consumer Financial Services. "While we consider misuse of the personal information to be highly unlikely as a result of this incident, we deeply apologize for any concerns this incident may cause our customers."

Despite the low likelihood of misuse of customers' personal information, People's will provide its affected customers with one year of a credit monitoring service at the bank's expense. The service will easily and quickly alert customers to possible fraudulent activities associated with their personal information, providing them with the ability to take early action to prevent damage to their credit.

People's has additional information available online at www.peoples.com/pclinfo.

Founded in 1842, People's Bank (peoples.com) is one of Connecticut's largest banks with assets of $11 billion, more than 240 ATMs and 153 branches, 70 of which offer convenient seven-day banking in Super Stop & Shop locations across the state. A diversified financial services company, People's Bank provides consumer, commercial, insurance, retail investment and trust services to personal and business banking customers.