(MONEY Magazine) – Since MONEY ran its investigative report on Americans' eroding personal privacy last August, many of you have written to us demanding government action to protect your secrets (see Your Letters, page 21). In the aftermath of our story, the government and the banking industry have announced privacy initiatives intended to help keep your secrets safe. While they are a good start, both plans have flaws. And a new workplace program could leave employees more vulnerable than ever. Here's what you should know about your medical, financial and workplace privacy:

--Medical. In September, Secretary of Health and Human Services Donna Shalala submitted to Congress an 81-page proposal for new limits on access to medical information by employers, researchers, drugmakers and direct marketers, along with civil and criminal penalties for violators. She also proposed new patient rights to examine medical records and propose corrections. What's not so smart is her plan to ensure easy access to your health records by law enforcement and intelligence officials. Enactment, warns American Psychiatric Association President Herbert Sacks, would permit "police paparazzi to prowl through the records of innocent citizens."

--Financial. Galvanized by MONEY's finding that Americans' privacy fears are widespread, the nation's four leading bank associations announced a set of industrywide privacy principles in September. These grant consumers the right to know what information banks are collecting about them, to see and correct it, and to prevent the sharing of that information with third-party direct marketers. However, the nation's banks continue to resist the Federal Trade Commission's call for similar rules for the sharing of information among affiliates.

--Workplace. Beginning Oct. 1, employers must report the names, addresses and Social Security numbers of all new workers for a National Directory of New Hires required by the 1996 welfare law. The states will provide wage information. The directory's purpose is to help states track down deadbeat parents, but it will also create the first federal data bank of working Americans. Warns Evan Hendricks, editor of the Privacy Times newsletter: "We are building up to a big privacy disaster."

If you're concerned about violations to your privacy, let your lawmakers know. Send your letters to MONEY at Protect Your Privacy, Room 32-38, Time & Life Bldg., Rockefeller Center, New York, N.Y. 10020 (fax: 212-522-0119), and we will forward them to the appropriate federal lawmakers. --A.R.D.