SEC commissioner calls out pitfalls in regulators’ structured data efforts

A commissioner at the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) warned about “potential pitfalls” with structured data, which regulators and lawmakers have embraced as a way to make data accessible and easy to use.

In a speech Monday in Washington, D.C., before the RegTech 2023 Data Summit, SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce said the agency’s rollout of structured data requirements lacks a strategic plan, doesn’t adequately address the costs of creating structured data for smaller entities, and may create data that is not useful to the public.

Other pitfalls include “the dangers of embedding in rules technology that inevitably becomes outdated; and the likely result of making it easier for government to process data, which is to increase the appetite for collecting ever more data,” she said.