FINRA wants to get too invasive for some members

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority Inc. is used to criticism. Too weak a regulator is the most common scolding, particularly from investor advocates who demand Wall Street’s self-regulator of all things brokerage to be tougher on brokers.

But now FINRA is being perceived in whole new light by some. Its efforts to improve the data it wants to collect, in order to become a more effective regulator, have turned it into something akin to the NSA in some of its members’ eyes.

“We have enough gathering of data by the NSA to last a lifetime,” one comment posted anonymously on Finra’s website about Finra’s data idea. Robert Weiss, who identified himself as an investor, wrote, “I am strongly opposed to any new government regulations and possible exposure to unauthorized persons having access to my personal information.” David Paul of Upper Gwynedd, Penn., wrote, “The government already has their nose too far under my tent.”