WASHINGTON, D.C. – This week, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) suffered a major cybersecurity breach of a social media account belonging to the agency. Following the breach, SEC Mission Creep – a project of the Taxpayers Protection Alliance Foundation (TPAF) – urged the agency to focus on its existing responsibilities to taxpayers and David Williams, TPAF President, offered the following comment:
“While the SEC is attempting to expand its authority further into the lives of American businesses and taxpayers by proposing a new rule that will require public companies to evaluate their direct and indirect impacts on climate and to report those findings to both shareholders and the federal government, it is clear they are unable to manage what responsibilities they do have. The fact that a hacker could successfully impersonate a government agency and announce market-shifting news is unconscionable. The SEC needs to get its house in order.
“The climate disclosure proposal the agency is currently advancing would force businesses to hand over large amounts of sensitive information related to its vendors and business practices. If this latest breach has taught the American public anything, it is that the SEC is not prepared to handle that information with the care it deserves and the care American businesses are entitled to. The SEC needs to abandon its expansionist notions and return to safeguarding taxpayers and securing systems related to their actual mission.”
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