Last week, when a model broker-dealer fee disclosure was introduced by regulators and the financial services industry, investor advocates claimed it was not an end-all, be-all for transparency.

At least one of its creators agrees.

“This was a good place to start. Hopefully this will create a momentum for increased transparency with other fees,” said Judith Shaw, who was elevated from president-elect to president of the North American Securities Administrators Association when the guidelines were unveiled at NASAA’s annual meeting.

On Monday, she offered transparency into her own thinking and that of the examiners association, which she will lead for the coming year.

For nearly a quarter of a century, Shaw, who holds a law degree and a brown belt in karate, has had her hand in state regulation ranging from jobs with Maine attorney general’s office to the state’s department of insurance to her current day-job as Maine’s chief securities regulator.

Here are excerpts from a phone interview:

Financial Advisor: How do you respond to criticisms that the fee disclosure guidelines don’t cover commissions, investment advisory fees, 12b-1 fees and revenue sharing among fund families, broker-dealers and insurance companies?

Shaw: We need to take a first step to increase transparency. What we find here in our office in Maine, at least, is we get many inquiries about miscellaneous fees. People understand they are going to pay commissions and advisory fees, but they are often surprised when they learn they are being charged a fee for something like the transfer of an account on the death of a spouse.

Financial Advisor: What do you see as the role of individual state regulators and NASAA in regulating robo-advisors?

Shaw: Clearly, robo-advisors are going to be big enough to be registered by the Securities and Exchange Commission rather than the states. But while state regulators do not examine advisors with over $100 million in assets under management, we can monitor them for violations of state fraud laws. State securities regulators and NASAA will look at whatever background algorithms they are using to make sure they are in compliance.

Financial Advisor: If the Labor Department’s proposed fiduciary rule for retirement plan advisors takes effect pretty much as is—and all signs are it will be—how will state regulators react?

Shaw: We will watch carefully as the firms implement the rule and certainly going well into the future we will continue our enforcement investor protection roles. We want DOL to modify the proposal to explicitly permit state securities regulation in private pension plans. As is, the rule is silent on whether there will be federal preemption.

Financial Advisor: Small advisory firms and state securities regulators don’t have a lot of money to spend on cyber security. How are your members coping with this reality both in terms of protecting their computer systems and monitoring the IT protections of advisors?

Shaw: This is one of the advantages of an association like NASAA. The individual state securities regulators may not have the resources to hire cyber security experts, but as a group of 50 we can develop the expertise. In addition, our examiners can alert small advisors to cyber securities resources … they can use. As far as internal cyber protection for our members, it should be done on an individual, state government-wide basis.

Financial Advisor: What personally identifiable information do state securities regulators have on the clients of advisory firms they examined that could be obtained by a skilled and determined hacker?

Shaw: I don’t want to go there.

Financial Advisor: A primary reason the Dodd-Frank act raised the size of advisors subject to state exams from $25 million in assets under management to $100 million was to let the SEC have fewer advisors under its oversight so they could examine them more frequently. With SEC-registered advisors being examined only once every 10 years, are you in favor of raising the threshold again?

Shaw: We’d have to do an analysis first. NASAA believes the best way to increase the frequency of exams is for Congress to let the SEC impose a fee on advisors.

Financial Advisor: How often do state regulators examine advisors?

Shaw: [Every] three to five years on average. In Maine, every newly registered advisor is examined in the first year.

Financial Advisor: Why is there an increased emphasis by state regulators on senior financial fraud?

Shaw: This is a growing problem because social isolation has increased. The types of communities we grew up in aren’t there. All our families used lived in close proximity. Now it is more common [that] children move away. In Fort Fairfield, a little town in northern Maine I grew up, 25 percent of residents are 65 and over and live alone. Sometimes the only contact they have is with neighbors and total strangers who are potential victimizers. E-mail and the Web are also allowing fraudsters to reach seniors more often than they could in the past.

Financial Advisor: What keeps you and your members up at night?

Shaw: Thing most troubling about our jobs is we are often called after the money has left and it is often difficult or impossible to get the money back.