WASHINGTON–The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) has joined with state agencies in releasing agency-specific action statements on tech capacity.
According to the Bureau, the statements reflect concrete actions to increase tech capacity, including actively hiring technologists, “which will help enforce the laws on the book and design remedies that work for consumers, workers, small businesses, and others in the digital era,” the CFPB and the agencies said.
“Amid a rapidly evolving tech ecosystem – including the wave of attention on generative AI – CFPB technologists work in interdisciplinary teams across the Bureau to help ensure that the rights of consumers are not being violated,” the statement continued. “This includes helping to identify emerging technology developments, spot potential issues, and where appropriate, help enforce the law and develop lasting remedies.”
A ‘Fundamental’
Added CFPB Director Rohit Chopra, "From cracking down on data abuses and shoddy AI to tracking Big Tech’s movement into financial services, technology is fundamental to the CFPB’s work. Our technologists help the agency enforce existing laws and track emerging risks to consumers to ensure that American families are protected through whatever technological changes the market encounters.”
The Specifics
Specifically, Chopra said the CFPB will be focusing on several goals in the short term, including to:
- Embed more technologists across the CFPB’s core functions
- Conduct research and analysis on the application of emerging technologies.
- Advance competitive marketplaces and assisting law abiding firms.
Chopra’s full statement can be found here.
HMDA Data Available
Separately, the CFPB said Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA) Modified Loan Application Register (LAR) data for 2023 are now available on the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council’s (FFIEC) HMDA Platform for approximately 5,089 HMDA filers.
The published data contain loan-level information filed by financial institutions and modified to protect consumer privacy, the CFPB said.
“To increase public accessibility, the annual loan-level LAR data for each HMDA filer are now available online. Previously, users could obtain LAR data only by making requests to specific institutions for their annual data,” the Bureau stated. “To allow for easier public access to all LAR data, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s 2015 HMDA rule made the data for each HMDA filer available electronically on the FFIEC’s HMDA Platform. In addition to institution-specific modified LAR files, users can download one combined file that contains all institutions’ modified LAR data.”
Additional Release
Later this year, the CFPB said the 2023 HMDA data will be available in other forms to provide users insights into the data.
“These will include nationwide loan-level datasets with all publicly available data for all HMDA reporters; aggregate and disclosure reports with summary information by geography and lender; and access to the 2023 data through the HMDA Data Browser to allow users to create custom datasets, reports, and data maps,” according to the CFPB.
The CFPB said it will later also publish a Data Point article highlighting key trends in the annual data.
The Resources
HMDA users may find the CFPB’s Beginner’s Guide to Accessing and Using HMDA Data useful for background on HMDA and tech tips for understanding and analyzing the data.
The 2023 HMDA Loan Application Register data can be found on the FFIEC’s HMDA Platform: https://ffiec.cfpb.gov/data-publication/modified-lar
Now With Free Shipping! The CUToday.info Daily News Email Keeps Getting Better!
The biggest, best and freshest news reporting in credit unions remains free, and now has an added bonus---free shipping to your email address! That’s right. Each morning CUToday.info delivers its daily Fresh Today news update offering the latest headlines and breaking news right to your email, with the easy-to-read headlines format allowing you to click on the stories that interest you most in order to learn more. So stop paying those bank-fee-like subscription prices from other so-called “news” publications!
If you haven’t yet signed up for the new email solution on which CUToday.info has partnered with ResponseGenius, you can do so here. Signing up requires less than one minute of your time—and it’s free!
Please note that after signing up you may need to go to your Spam/Junk folder and mark the morning headlines email as safe. CUToday.info does not provide its list of readers and emails to outside parties, and we will not be contacting you to sell you an extended warranty or sending you any links so you may cash in on an inheritance you didn’t know was coming.
And did we mention it’s free?