U.S. SEC Chair Warns of Risks in Crypto Surveillance and Calls for Limiting Government Access to Personal Data
On December 15, 2025, SEC Chair Paul Atkins participated in a roundtable in Washington, D.C. focused on privacy and surveillance, marking the sixth crypto-related discussion convened by the SEC that year. Atkins expressed concerns that the technology driving crypto innovation could also enable unprecedented levels of government surveillance. He urged policymakers to implement measures that would limit government access to personal data to protect individual liberty.
Atkins pointed to the Consolidated Audit Trail (CAT) and regulations enacted following the 2008 financial crisis as examples of surveillance-enhancing tools that risk infringing on investors' freedoms. He warned that blockchain technology, if left unchecked, might become the most powerful financial surveillance architecture in history.
The SEC is planning to propose new rules regulating the crypto sector and intends to work closely with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). This collaboration will continue the ongoing Project Crypto initiatives, which aim to clarify the definition of crypto securities, establish tokenization standards, and create an innovation exemption framework. Atkins noted that many digital assets likely do not qualify as securities, which would place them outside the SEC's regulatory jurisdiction.
The discussion also highlighted tensions between privacy technologies and law enforcement. The article referenced Department of Justice prosecutions and actions by the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) related to privacy-preserving tools such as Tornado Cash. In this context, Commissioner Hester Peirce advocated that regulatory responsibilities, including those under the Bank Secrecy Act, should not be imposed on software developers who do not hold custody of users’ assets.
