Crypto executives, policy researchers, and national security experts testified before a House subcommittee on Thursday on how to modernize anti-money laundering laws for an era of AI and digital assets.
The House Financial Services Committee’s National Security, Illicit Finance, and International Financial Institutions Subcommittee held a hearing on Modernizing the BSA for Financial Crime in the 21st Century, revisiting the Bank Secrecy Act, the 1970 law that requires banks and financial institutions to report suspicious activity and large transactions
The hearing landed as crypto firms, banks, and civil liberties groups push to refocus the BSA on actionable intelligence over reporting volume, while the Trump administration broadens its reach over non-citizen customers. TRM Labs Global Head of Policy Ari Redbord, testifying before the Subcommittee, told lawmakers that North Korea stole over $2 billion in digital assets in 2025 and another $600 million in early 2026, while pig butchering networks stripped more than $35 billion from Americans last year. Redbord warned that AI-enabled scam activity surged 500% over the past year while illicit funds now move across wallets within 24 to 48 hours, compressing response windows to the point where “retrospective reporting frameworks are structurally incapable of generating a response in time” because “the framework that helped us win yesterday will not be enough to win today.” What is the Bank Secrecy Act?
The Bank Secrecy Act is the backbone of U.S. anti-money laundering law, requiring banks and crypto firms registered as money services businesses to file suspicious activity reports, currency transaction reports for amounts over $10,000, and to verify customer identities. Subcommittee Chairman Warren Davidson (R-OH) opened by calling the BSA a “bloated surveillance machine demanding endless reports without delivering proportional results,” noting institutions file nearly 5 million SARs and 21 million CTRs annually….