A Montreal businessman says he, like a man in West Virginia, is receiving confidential information from CIBC via fax.

Stephen Oakes says the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce has sent him faxes for the last four years.

All the faxes were transfer authorizations for registered investments like educational and retirement savings plans and contained confidential information, including phone numbers and Social Insurance Numbers.

"I kind of feel for the client. If this was my information, I certainly wouldn't want my information in the hands of a stranger," Oakes told CTV News.

Oakes has a small office in the Montreal suburb of Dorval, not far from Pierre Trudeau International Airport. He shares a fax machine with his brother Daniel, who runs a security and surveillance film.

Since 2000, Oakes estimated he's received 24 faxes, each containing private information. The last such fax he received was in September. There have been none since.

Oakes called the CIBC after receiving each fax. He even sent emails, but despite his efforts, he got little response.

"I was led to believe that this was an isolated incident strictly with my fax machine," he says.

CTV News has learned that CIBC isn't the only bank mistakenly sending confidential customer data to strangers. Dan Cook, a Vancouver talk show host, said he's received about 50 faxes in the last year at his home, all of them intended for a Royal Bank branch. This week, he got three more faxes.

And another man, Tony Usher ,says he has received a Scotiabank fax that was destined for a branch of the Bank of Nova Scotia in Halifax.

CTV News and The Globe and Mail first reported the problem of faxes going astray when we interviewed Wade Peer, who runs a scrap yard in West Virginia, and said he had been receiving similar faxes for the past three years.

He has launched legal action against the bank, which CIBC is rejecting.

This time, CIBC CEO John Hunkin has taken the remarkable step of phoning Oakes personally to apologize.

"I think it reflects the seriousness that everybody takes with this matter," said the bank's Rob McLeod.

Since the problem became public, CIBC  has stopped internally faxing documents and has taken its fax number out of service.

The Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada is investigating that case to determine whether the bank violated privacy laws.

The CIBC has refused to speak on camera but they did issue a statement saying: "We are aware of faxes being misdirected to Mr. Oakes' business. That fax unit and the numbers surrounding it have been removed from service."

With a report from CTV's David Akin