Does anyoone know how the BSA got this name?

Why not the Anti-Financial Crimes Act or the Be on Your Best Bahavior Act? The SECRECY part continually confuses employees and makes them think of keeping customer information private, not monitoring for money laundering and terrorist financing.

I am training the Board on the BSA for the first time today and I think the answer to this question would be some good opening trivia.

For that matter, why is it the BANK Secrecy Act, when it also applies to savings associations, credit unions, casinos, MSBs, and all of the other types of "financial institutions"? I've always said that the only part of the title that they labeled right was the word "Act".

I've wondered this same question. When we started doing our refresher trainings I stumbled across a statement in the FFIEC exam manual that indicated the name was actually The Currency & Foreign Transactions Reporting Act, "commonly known as The Bank Secrecy Act".

Why two names?

hmmm, I'll have to look in to that...

From the IRS website, Bank Secrecy Act History and Law:

4.26.5.2 (01-01-2003)
History of the Bank Secrecy Act

1.

On October 26, 1970, in response to increasing reports of people bringing bags full of currency of doubtful origin into banks for deposit, Congress passed the Currency and Foreign Transactions Reporting Act, Public Law 91-508. This law is often cited as the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA) because Part I, codified in Title 12 of the United States Code (U.S.C.) requires in part that banks not keep secret certain internal changes. Part II of the law, sometimes cited as the Currency and Foreign Transactions Reporting Act, is codified now at 31 U.S.C., Money and Finance, Chapter 53, Monetary Transactions, Part II, Records and Reports on Monetary Instruments Transactions. Since the law appears in Title 31, the Anti-Money Laundering (AML) compliance program based on it is often called the Title 31 program to distinguish it from Title 26, Internal Revenue Code (IRC) Section 6050I, law side of the AML program.


Link

thanks--totally what i was looking for

Because they couldn't call it the Bu!! $hit Act

ROTFLMBO

That's hilarious! My husband omits the "A" and refers to me as the "BS Officer" when I try to explain my job to him!

I just thought it was another Orwellian term: something that means the opposite of how it is worded.

I think the Bank Secrecy Act is one of those laws that has an interesting history itself of how it arrived to where it is today. The Act has been amended numerous times and additional laws added to the original Act over the years to keep pace with the ways criminals try to hide money from the IRS and other law enforcement agencies.

It's easy to change a law's requirements, but it seems once a law gets it's name, the name sticks. I'm sure if it was passed today, it would be called something different.

It was also the subject of a Supreme Court decision regarding it's constitutionality. (That court decision is why we have the federal Right to Financial Privacy Act.)

And that only scratches the surface of this law. The Bank Secrecy Act is something that is going to be with us for a long, long time to come.