DC Journal
By: Vance Ginn

If we want to protect consumer privacy, strengthen innovation and restore competitive markets, then the path forward is clear: repeal the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s Section 1033 rule — and shut down the CFPB.

For too long, the CFPB has served not as a neutral regulator but as a tool for centralizing power in Washington and forcing private actors into government-designed frameworks. Its most recent attempt, the Section 1033 “open banking” rule, is a case study in bureaucratic overreach.

Congress included Section 1033 in the Dodd-Frank Act to ensure that consumers could access their financial data. It was never intended to mandate how that data must flow across the financial system or to give third-party firms free access to private infrastructure.

In 2024, the CFPB finalized the Section 1033 rule that did just that. It required banks and credit unions to hand over consumer data to third-party apps and aggregators — without compensation, without clear liability standards and without meaningful accountability.