Corporate Transparency Act – The Access Rule

The Corporate Transparency Act ("CTA") directs the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network ("FinCEN") to establish and maintain a national registry of corporate beneficial ownership information ("BOI"). The CTA is comprised of three separate FinCEN rules: the reporting rule, the access rule, and revisions to the 2016 Customer Due Diligence Rule. FinCEN's Beneficial Ownership Information Reporting Rule (the "Reporting Rule") becomes effective January 1, 2024, and requires certain entities to report beneficial ownership information to FinCEN.

In the second of the three rules, FinCEN is charged with developing a new IT system to house BOI, the Beneficial Ownership Secure System ("BOSS") and regulating security and access to the BOSS system (the "Access Rule"). The proposed rulemaking for the Access Rule closed for comment on February 14, 2023, but has not been issued in final form. The Access Rule proposes to allow access to the BOSS system for five specific categories