(MONEY Magazine) – You're not asking much, simply for the details of your finances and private life to remain private. That's how readers overwhelmingly reacted to August's "Protect Your Privacy." It revealed the five biggest threats to personal privacy, including the release of medical records to employers, insurance providers and mail-order firms. For example, Roberta Riley (pictured here) informed only her doctors and husband of her pregnancy, yet she was deluged with solicitations for new-baby and expectant-mother products. Readers praised MONEY's advice on how to guard against credit fraud, minimize leaks of confidential data and remove yourself from junk-mail lists. "As you suggested," writes John R. Manning of Clifton, Va., "I asked the Direct Marketing Association to have my name taken off lists." Other readers offered ideas, including one to change Social Security policy.

Many of the most serious privacy abuses involve the use of a person's Social Security number. Not only do the health insurance industry, the credit-card industry, the motor vehicle bureaus and financial institutions want your SSN, but so do schools, some supermarkets and many small businesses. Even if they don't exchange information with others, they do nothing to protect your SSN. For example, schools routinely post grades alongside it, medical organizations like HMOs put it on the card as your membership number, and in many states it is used as your driver's license number. Anyone can then utilize it, along with your name and address, to get confidential information from your financial institutions and to commit all sorts of fraud.

According to the Social Security Administration, private-sector businesses are "free to request someone's SSN and use it for any purpose that does not violate a federal or state law. Anyone can refuse to disclose his or her number, but the requester can refuse its services without it." A change in this policy would go a long way to curb abuses. It should be illegal for private businesses to refuse service to an individual who does not wish to provide a Social Security number. SEYMOUR M. WEINSTEIN Farmingdale, N.Y.

I recently received a solicitation from a well-known publisher of accounting and tax guides. To order the publication, here's what you were supposed to provide on the no-postage-required, business-reply postcard (translated: exposed for all the world to see): type of credit card you are using for payment; credit-card number; the card's date of expiration; your phone number and your signature.

With all of the insidious ways criminals rip off unsuspecting victims, why would anyone make it easier for them by providing credit-card information in such a manner? Don't do it. JOSEPH C. OLSZEWSKI Erie, Pa.

Your article shows how anyone with access to a health maintenance organization's computers can obtain confidential patient medical information but omits an important corollary. Although HMOs, their physicians and employees can access patient records at will, patients themselves are denied equal access. HMOs know that records represent the golden key that opens all doors to accountability. Why help patients blow the whistle on the home team? ROBERT FINNEY Encinitas, Calif.

BETTER LATE THAN NEVER

Your March 1992 Editor's Notes urged President Bush "to throw his weight behind the effort to restore fully deductible contributions as part of an enhanced IRA"--an idea drafted in Congress by Sens. Lloyd Bentsen (D-Texas) and William Roth (R-Del.). I can't believe it took over five years to pass the tax-deductible Roth IRA bill! I have had an IRA since the financial vehicle's inception and have made nondeductible annual contributions. Now I will finally be able to enjoy all the benefits my IRA was designed to provide. Thank you for your efforts. SYBILLA L. PREST Green Oaks, Ill. WHO'S AFRAID OF THE BIG BAD BEAR?

I was outraged when I saw your August cover with its big, bold red message: "Sell Stock Now!" Yes, I know that you are not recommending that people sell all their stocks, only that they cash in 20% of their shares. But how many people will simply view the cover and panic? Despite your past good advice, I will not sell my stocks. In fact, I hope others listen to you and drive the market down for a while. While they are doing that, I'll weather the storm and buy the bargains. RICHARD WENZEL Chicago