CFPB Field Hearing Investigates Storage, Use and Transmission of Digital Financial Records

Today at 11AM MST, The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) plans to host a Field Hearing on consumer access to digital financial records.

In his prepared Hearing statement, CFPB Director Richard Cordray characterized digital financial records as "an opportunity and a challenge."

These records yield "enormous insight that can empower consumers to make decisions and improve their financial lives" and can "enable great efficiencies," he said, but added that there are also "unanswered questions about how the information is being shared, by and to whom, and how safely."

At the hearing, the CFPB intends to discuss several of those questions, including:

• How and to what extent can consumers authorize data aggregators to access and/or share their digital financial records?
• How may financial institutions share digital financial information with third parties safely?
• What market incentives or disincentives are there for consumers to access their information?
• How are financial records transmitted to and stored by third parties?

Scheduled speakers include:

Richard Cordray, Director, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau

Zixta Martinez, Associate Director of External Affairs, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau

Edward (Ed) Leary, Department of Financial Institutions Commissioner, Utah

Steven Boms, Vice President, Yodlee

Ryan Falvey, Managing Director, Center for Financial Services Innovation

Alaina Gimbert, Senior Vice President, The Clearing House

Ed Mierzwinski, Consumer Program Director, Public Interest Research Group

Rob Morgan, Vice President, American Bankers Association

Joe Valenti, Director of Consumer Finance, Center for American Progress

The insideARM Perspective

Of course, digital financial records play a very large role in the debt collections space, so any signal, opinion, enforcement action or potential future rule from the CFPB on the use, storage and transmission of digital financial records will have an outsized impact on creditor and collector operations. insideARM will continue to monitor the Hearing and the CFPB for any new developments.