The French Senate has adopted a bill that would allow the country's tax authorities to automatically exchange crypto transaction data with their counterparts abroad, advancing a measure built on international standards developed by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).

The bill cleared its first reading in the upper house on Tuesday and was then transmitted to the National Assembly as Bill no. 3421 for consideration, the next step in a legislative process that requires approval from both chambers of the French Parliament. It covers two components: an agreement on exchanging crypto tax information and an update to an existing agreement covering financial account information.

The crypto agreement is based on the OECD's Crypto-Asset Reporting Framework (CARF), which sets common standards for participating jurisdictions to collect and automatically exchange information on crypto transactions. For French crypto users, adoption would extend data sharing beyond the EU-only arrangements already in place, tying France's tax authority into an exchange network that spans every participating jurisdiction.

France already introduced domestic crypto reporting obligations through the 2025 Finance Act, which implemented the crypto reporting amendment to the European Union's Directive on Administrative Cooperation, known as DAC8. Under those rules, crypto service providers must report customer identities and transaction data to tax authorities, which in turn share the information with authorities in users' EU countries of residence. The bill would add an international layer to that machinery, allowing crypto transaction data to flow with counterparts abroad, not only within the EU.

The Senate vote comes as French lawmakers debate further crypto tax changes in the 2027 budget. The National Assembly adopted an amendment on Oct. 16 that would make gains from conversions into certain fiat-pegged stablecoins taxable from Jan. 1, 2027, though the measure is not yet law. Lawmakers resumed debate on the budget's revenue section on Tuesday, with a vote scheduled for Nov. 3. Both files now sit before the National Assembly.

Data security and physical attack concerns

Tax reporting under DAC8 raises data security concerns because it involves sharing personal information — including names, addresses, tax numbers and transaction volumes — between EU tax authorities, Faustine Fleuret, global head of public affairs at lending protocol Morpho, told Cointelegraph.

"In a country where crypto holders have been physically targeted, a leaked list of who trades what, and for how much, is not only a privacy issue but first and foremost a safety issue," she said.

The European Commission plans to create a central repository for crypto reports by the end of 2026, which would give each member state's tax authorities access to information concerning its tax residents. Fleuret warned that centralizing such information could create a "single point of failure" for sensitive crypto transaction data.

Her remarks follow a rise in physical attacks targeting cryptocurrency investors, commonly known as "wrench attacks." During the first half of 2026, France accounted for 33 of the 52 verified wrench attacks recorded worldwide, according to blockchain security company CertiK. In one March incident, a French couple in their late 50s was robbed of about $1 million worth of Bitcoin by criminals posing as police officers.

Related reading from Cointelegraph Magazine: France is world's most dangerous place for Bitcoiners: 90 attacks in 7 months.

Source: Cointelegraph