Federal agency seeks to monitor 80 percent of U.S. consumer credit card transactions in 2013Madison Ruppert If accomplished, this would be yet another massive federal database containing the private information of Americans. It would also be an additional database the government cant protect. The data mining program was revealed in a CFPB planning document for fiscal years 2013-17 obtained by the Washington Examiner. The markets monitoring program would collect information on some 42 billion transactions made with around 933 million credit cards. The CFPB, established in 2011, came under fire soon after its inception. In June 2012 the entire agencys constitutionality was challenged in a lawsuit. In July of this year, a company pressured to turn over millions of consumer records to the CFPB also filed a lawsuit. Even the Richard Cordray, the newly-appointed director, acknowledged the many concerns. People arent sure what to make of it, Cordray said to The Washington Post. Theyre worried about a new agency and how it will exercise authority. Cordray defended the CFPB data mining practice at a House Financial services Committee hearing on Wednesday. He said the agency is monitoring the use of credit cards at 110 banks. Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas) was also quite critical of the agency, noting that it is designed to operate outside the usual system of checks and balances that applies to every other government agency. Rep Patrick McHenry (R-N.C.) pointed out the apparent conflict of interest in the issuing of a $5 million contract by CFPB to a company co-founded by the agencys Office of Research. Duffy attempted to get Cordray to say exactly how many credit cards are being monitored by the CFPB but Cordray reportedly refused multiple times until he listed just five major institutions. Cordray identified Morgan Chase, Bank of America, Capital One, Discover and American Express, according to the Washington Examiner. The agency has never given us a number of how many Americans have been surveilled, Duffy said. However, weve seen in their disclosures they are collecting 80 percent of credit cards in America, 1.16 billion credit cards, which means that they are collecting information on just under a billion credit cards in America. Thats a scary number. On top of monitoring credit card transactions, the agency also reportedly hopes to monitor 95 percent of all mortgage transactions by 2014. Agencies suggest that consumers take a proactive stance on monitoring their own credit reports, in an effort to combat fraud, identity theft, or any other kind of misuse. www.top10CreditReport.com can provide you with several options to access you personal credit information. An interesting aspect of the recent criticism of the CFPB is that it seems to largely come from Republicans or otherwise conservative individuals. This isnt at all surprising, given the wild partisanship of individuals in Washington. In the case of the National Security Agencys surveillance program, democrats largely opposed it under George W. Bush then completely flip-flopped to support it under Obama. If a republican happened to be in office and a similar agency was employing similar tactics, it is almost certain that the same people now supporting the CFPB would oppose it and vice versa. Id love to hear your opinion, take a look at your story tips and even your original writing if you would like to get it published. I am also available for interviews on radio, television or any other format. Please email me at Admin@EndtheLie.com Please support our work and help us start to pay contributors by doing your shopping through our Amazon link or check out some must-have products at our store. This article first appeared at End the Lie. 