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Student loan companies will face consequences if they mislead borrowers and collect on private debt that has been discharged by a bankruptcy court, according to a letter sent by the country’s top consumer watchdog to Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) that was obtained by Yahoo Finance. "I am deeply concerned that borrowers are burdened by decades-old private student loan debt and potentially unlawful collection efforts," Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) Director Rohit Chopra stated in the March 8 letter. "I have directed CFPB staff to closely scrutinize these issues, including whether companies are making false representations." Senators led by Durbin and Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) previously raised concerns to the CFPB over a report from the Student Borrower Protection Center (SPBC) that found student loan servicers misrepresented the possibility of discharging certain private student loans through bankruptcy proceedings. While “qualified loans,” those used to finance higher education at an institution that qualifies for federal student aid, require borrowers to prove an "undue hardship" to discharge the debt in bankruptcy, roughly $50 billion in debt held by 2.6 million borrowers is considered “unqualified” and therefore doesn’t have this requirement. According to the SBPC, student loan servicers in some cases did not acknowledge discharge orders from bankruptcy proceedings and misled borrowers by telling them that their debt was not actually discharged.