The CFPB announced that it will hold a symposium on consumer access to financial records and Section 1033 of the Dodd-Frank Act on February 26, 2020.  The event will be webcast on the Bureau’s website.

In November 2016, the CFPB issued a request for information (RFI) about market practices related to consumer access to financial information, and in October 2017, it released a set of “Consumer Protection Principles” for participants “in the developing market for services based on the consumer-authorized use of financial data.”

Section 1033 requires that “[s]ubject to rules prescribed by the Bureau, a covered person shall make available to a consumer, upon request, information in the control or possession of such person concerning the consumer financial product or service that the consumer obtained from such covered person, including information related to any transaction, or series of transactions, to the account including costs, charges, and usage data.”  The CFPB indicated that, in responding to the RFI, a number of stakeholders, primarily account data holders, questioned Section 1033’s applicability to consumer-authorized data access, as opposed to consumer’s direct access, and encouraged the CFPB not to engage in Section 1033 rulemaking.

The symposium will feature remarks by Director Kraninger and consist of the following three panels:

• The first panel will assess the current landscape of holders of consumer data and the benefits and risks of consumer-authorized data access.  The panel will be moderated by Paul Watkins, Assistant Director in the Bureau’s Office of Innovation.  The panel members are:
  • Becky Heironimus, Managing Vice President of Customer Platforms, Data Ethics and Privacy, Capital One
  • John Pitts, Policy Lead, Plaid
  • Natalie Talpas, Senior Vice President, Product Group Manager, Digital, PNC
  • Christina Tetreault, Senior Policy Counsel, Consumer Reports
  • Nick Thomas, Co-founder and Chief Technology Officer, Finicity
• The second panel will include a discussion of market developments in consumer-authorized data access.  The panel will be moderated by Will Wade-Gery, Senior Advisor in the Bureau’s Office of Innovation.  The panel members are:
  • Steven Boms, Executive Director, FDATA N.A.
  • Lila Fakhraie, Senior Vice President, Digital Banking APIs, Wells Fargo Bank
  • Jason Gross, Co-Founder & CEO, Petal
  • Melissa Koide, CEO, FinRegLab
  • James Reuter, CEO & President, First Bank Holding Company
• The third panel will focus on the future state of the market, as well as considerations for policymakers on how to ensure consumer data is safeguarded while ensuring that consumers have continual access to their data.  The panel will be moderated by Thomas Devlin, Managing Counsel in the Bureau’s Research, Markets and Regulation Division.  The panel members are:
  • Jane Barratt, Chief Advocacy Officer, MX
  • Thomas P. Brown, Partner, Antitrust and Competition and Global Banking and Payment Systems Practices, Paul Hastings LLP
  • Brian Knight, Director of Innovation and Governance, Mercatus Center
  • Dan Murphy, Policy Manager, Financial Health Network
  • Natalie Williams, General Counsel, Responsible Banking and Data, JPMorgan Chase
  • Chi Chi Wu, Staff Attorney, National Consumer Law Center