PRIVACY What does your bank know, and whom can it tell? Find out

DALLAS MORNING NEWS
Do you want your bank to share your Social Security number with a discount travel service? Or tell its brokerage division that you have $6,957.62 in your savings account and $2,340.02 in your checking account? Or tell retailers that you trek to Sam's Club on the last Friday of every month?
Your bank can glean all this intelligence by studying your application form and watching the activity in your account. Banks and credit unions are allowed to do this, and they can share the information with others.
In the whole scheme of things, there's not much you can force your bank to do -- but you do have some control over this.
Taking control
If you want your bank or credit union to quit talking about you behind your back so much, you have to tell them.
The first step: Don't throw away the tiny-type notices that appear every once in a while with your monthly statement. These pesky pieces of paper are hard to keep track of and harder yet to understand, but buried deep in the fine print are your bank's instructions on how to "opt out" of letting it share your information.
This is the time of year when bank privacy notices tend to show up in mailboxes. And later this year or early next year, they will begin to reflect changes in federal law aimed at toughening protections for your privacy and financial information.
Banks tout benefits
You may not mind if your bank shares your information. Bankers say they do it so they can serve customers better.
For instance, Citigroup Inc., the nation's largest financial-services company, has 1,700 affiliates offering everything from home loans to insurance to credit cards.
In recent testimony to Congress, Martin Wong, general counsel of Citigroup's global consumer group, said customers want one-stop shopping. To accomplish that, the bank has to provide information to its affiliates to simplify credit decisions and provide discounts to loyal customers.
Other big banks echo this thinking.
"It helps if we know more about you and your lifestyle," says Jay Soloway, senior vice president and associate general counsel at J.P. Morgan Chase & amp; Co. "If you have young children, you might want to plan for college education. If you are an older person, you are getting ready for retirement, and we can offer you retirement products."
The decision about whether to let banks share your information comes down to a recurring issue of the digital revolution -- convenience vs. privacy.
Risks of sharing
Consumer advocates worry that banks might misuse your information. Most banks say they value your privacy and aren't as loose with your information as the law allows them to be. But there have been several high-profile cases in which banks have sold customers' information to unscrupulous third parties.
And of course there's the risk of identity theft, still the fastest-growing white-collar crime in America. Criminal rings are looking for any scrap of personal data that they can get about you.
The more that data spreads, the more likely it is to fall into the wrong hands, consumer advocates say.
However, you have some protections under the Fair Credit Reporting Act and the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, which deregulated the financial-services industry.
Banks are required to send notices explaining their privacy policies every year, and many pick the beginning of the year to mail them. The notices include a toll-free number or an address you can contact to opt out of the sharing of certain types of information.
"You have a right to stop banks from sharing information that they obtained from you," says Ed Mierzwinski, consumer program director at the U.S. Public Interest Research Group in Washington. "I didn't sign up to do business with 1,300 affiliates. I didn't sign up for all of them to know everything about me."
What they know
With information from your bank application, your account activity and your credit report, banks know how often you shop at Joe's Liquor Shack, whether you're making child-support payments and how many hot checks you've written in the last five years.
"They know where I shop and when I shop," says Peggy Twohig, assistant director for financial practices at the Federal Trade Commission. "They know who I write checks to. They know my investments."
Under the law, unless you opt out, banks can give their affiliated companies your name, address, Social Security number, credit history, account balances and transactions. With nonaffiliated companies, such as retailers and telemarketers, banks can share some of the same information, although without as much detail.
Under the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, you can tell your bank not to share some personal details with nonaffiliates. Under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, you can tell your bank not to divulge some details to affiliates, such as information related to your credit-worthiness. Even if you do opt out, though, banks can still share some general information about your account activity with their affiliates.