Apple Pay, Other Tech Firms Come Under CFPB Oversight (1)

The top US consumer watchdog will supervise Apple Inc. and other major technology firms that offer digital wallets and payment apps, finalizing a proposal from last year with several changes.

The US Consumer Financial Protection Bureau will now treat those companies more like banks as long as they handle more than 50 million transactions a year, conducted in US dollars, according to a statement Thursday. The original proposal set the supervision threshold at 5 million annual transactions.

“Digital payments have gone from novelty to necessity and our oversight must reflect this reality,” CFPB Director Rohit Chopra said in the statement. ...