Financial firms gear up for consumer privacy deadline.

Nowadays, it's an increasingly common concern--personal or financial information winding up in the wrong hands.

In what allegedly was a glaring misuse of that information, the Minnesota attorney general last month charged that FleetBoston Financial Corp. improperly shared consumer data with telemarketers. Fleet has fought the suit, but also recently unveiled what many consider one of the most far-reaching customer privacy policies in the industry. The new policy requires customer approval before the bank shares personal financial information with another institution.

As the Fleet policy takes effect, a broad array of Massachusetts businesses--from banks to mutual fund companies--are scurrying to make a July 1 deadline to devise similar privacy policies, a …