Former CFPB Chief Technologist Tells Court Agency Cuts Put Data at Risk

Former Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) Chief Technologist Erie Meyer reportedly said in court documents filed Friday (Feb. 28) that the cancellation of cybersecurity contracts at the agency puts sensitive data at risk.

Thirty-two cybersecurity contracts have been cancelled at the CFPB amid the recent cutbacks at the agency, Meyer said in the filing, Bloomberg reported Friday.

“That data is crucial to everything from identifying and assisting victims of consumer fraud and providing them with court-ordered relief, to tracking the financial information that is critical to the Bureau’s role in helping to stabilize financial markets, to responding to consumer companies,” Meyer said, per the report.

Meyer’s declaration was filed along with a National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) lawsuit that relates to the firing of bureau employees, according to the report.

This news comes on the same day that it was reported that several federal employees said in statements submitted for the same lawsuit that the new leadership of the CFPB plans to wind down the agency and fire most of its staff, keeping only five statutorily mandated positions.

The NTEU said in a Feb. 10 press release announcing the lawsuit that a shutdown of the CFPB would violate the separation of powers, as the agency was created by Congress.

“What is happening to CFPB should shock all Americans who are wondering what will happen to consumers without the CFPB on the job, and more broadly, what happens when the executive branch ignores the will of Congress,” Doreen Greenwald, national president of the NTEU, said in the release.

When Jonathan McKernan appeared before the Senate Banking Committee during a hearing on his nomination to lead the CFPB, he told lawmakers Thursday (Feb. 27) that there have been too many cases in which the agency has acted beyond its authority and that it should be right-sized and made efficient.

“It has pushed beyond the limits of its statutory authority,” McKernan said. “It has seized opportunities to expand its jurisdiction and power. It has offended our basic notions of fairness and due process when it has regulated by enforcement. And it has harmed consumers through higher prices and reduced choice when it has failed to strike an appropriate balance between costs and benefits in prescribing new regulations.”