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Tell HN: Equifax free credit report dark patterns

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Re: Tell HN: Equifax free credit report dark patterns

#51

Post by g051051 »

vegetablepotpie wrote: post #27

The problem is, as you articulated, they are required by law to provide credit reporting information about you to you. They have no incentive to do this because they make their money by collecting and selling data about us. They have every reason to use this reporting requirement to collect more information about you. They have every reason to conflate credit freeze with credit hold , and confuse consumers in order t…

> They have successfully convinced the public that identity theft is a separate and distinct crime done exclusively by one person to another rather than simply fraud that they are aiding and abetting.

This demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of how credit reporting works.

When "identity theft" occurs, it's important to realize that the credit reporting firms are not involved. That is solely due to failures, at the institutions that actually grant credit, to verify the identity of the person they are interacting with.

The flow goes: a fraudster uses harvested data to impersonate someone to a credit grantor, such as a credit card company. The credit grantor, accepting this identity at face value, asks the credit reporting agency (CRA) about the credit rating of the impersonated entity. The CRA says "Joe Victim has a relatively low risk of fraud". So the identity theft has already occurred before the CRA is even consulted.

Later on, when the fraudster fails to pay as agreed, the credit grantor incorrectly reports to the CRA that the fraud was caused by Joe Victim. Again, the CRA is just relying on the data provided to them by their clients.

Re: Tell HN: Equifax free credit report dark patterns

#52

Post by g051051 »

olliej wrote: post #11

I still love the whole "we know our data is wrong, but we sell it as fact, and know that that information is used to impact cost to you, but you're required to constantly check with us, or pay us to tell you when we're lying". Yet somehow this isn't extortion, and somehow it's not illegal defamation. The moment credit agencies started running their own monitoring services, it seemed like they were openly admitting th…

> The moment credit agencies started running their own monitoring services, it seemed like they were openly admitting that they were defaming people. I still do not understand why this is legal.

If you're signed up for credit monitoring, you get notified when your credit info gets changed, so you have a chance to react if it's an error (or fraud). How is that defamation? Why would it be illegal?

Re: Tell HN: Equifax free credit report dark patterns

#53

Post by lolinder »

g051051 wrote: post #51
vegetablepotpie wrote: post #27

The problem is, as you articulated, they are required by law to provide credit reporting information about you to you. They have no incentive to do this because they make their money by collecting and selling data about us. They have every reason to use this reporting requirement to collect more information about you. They have every reason to conflate credit freeze with credit hold , and confuse consumers in order t…

> They have successfully convinced the public that identity theft is a separate and distinct crime done exclusively by one person to another rather than simply fraud that they are aiding and abetting. This demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of how credit reporting works. When "identity theft" occurs, it's important to realize that the credit reporting firms are not involved . That is solely due to failures,…

I understood the comment about aiding and abetting to be a reference to the fact that Equifax leaked about half of all Social Security Numbers back in 2017. For 145 million Americans the "harvested data" you refer to was data that the credit bureaus hoovered up and then failed to protect.

Re: Tell HN: Equifax free credit report dark patterns

#54

Post by g051051 »

lolinder wrote: post #53
g051051 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They have successfully convinced the public that identity theft is a separate and distinct crime done exclusively by one person to another rather than simply fraud that they are aiding and abetting. This demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of how credit reporting works. When "identity theft" occurs, it's important to realize that the credit reporting firms are not involved . That is solely due to failures,…

I understood the comment about aiding and abetting to be a reference to the fact that Equifax leaked about half of all Social Security Numbers back in 2017. For 145 million Americans the "harvested data" you refer to was data that the credit bureaus hoovered up and then failed to protect.

> Equifax leaked about half of all Social Security Numbers back in 2017.

They weren't leaked, they were stolen. Does a bank "leak money" when it's robbed?

Re: Tell HN: Equifax free credit report dark patterns

#55

Post by sidewndr46 »

g051051 wrote: post #51
vegetablepotpie wrote: post #27

The problem is, as you articulated, they are required by law to provide credit reporting information about you to you. They have no incentive to do this because they make their money by collecting and selling data about us. They have every reason to use this reporting requirement to collect more information about you. They have every reason to conflate credit freeze with credit hold , and confuse consumers in order t…

> They have successfully convinced the public that identity theft is a separate and distinct crime done exclusively by one person to another rather than simply fraud that they are aiding and abetting. This demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of how credit reporting works. When "identity theft" occurs, it's important to realize that the credit reporting firms are not involved . That is solely due to failures,…

You might want to rethink that. Credit reporting firms actively aid identity fraudsters because it is profitable

https://privacyrights.org/data-breaches/court-ventures

Re: Tell HN: Equifax free credit report dark patterns

#56

Post by sidewndr46 »

gfs wrote: post #2

Credit reports are a racket. I've barely had any luck obtaining one of my reports from the site in the past few years. I'm at the point where I think I will freeze my credit.

I'm in my mid 30s at this point. Starting on my 18th birthday I've never been allowed to see my credit record from at least one bureau. Any attempt to do so is met with a requirement to prove my identity, and any attempt to prove my identity is responded to with a request for further documentation.

Re: Tell HN: Equifax free credit report dark patterns

#57

Post by sidewndr46 »

biftek wrote: post #7
gfs wrote: post #2

Credit reports are a racket. I've barely had any luck obtaining one of my reports from the site in the past few years. I'm at the point where I think I will freeze my credit.

Everyone should freeze their credit by default, it's very easy to unfreeze when you actually need to apply for something.

I did that years ago and I've passed multiple hard credit checks. It doesn't do anything.

Re: Tell HN: Equifax free credit report dark patterns

#58

Post by mindslight »

olliej wrote: post #11

I still love the whole "we know our data is wrong, but we sell it as fact, and know that that information is used to impact cost to you, but you're required to constantly check with us, or pay us to tell you when we're lying". Yet somehow this isn't extortion, and somehow it's not illegal defamation. The moment credit agencies started running their own monitoring services, it seemed like they were openly admitting th…

The answer is that they literally bought their own law exempting themselves from defamation laws. It's called the "Fair" Credit Reporting Act.

Legislative sanity would see a repeal of the FCRA and the addition of a US equivalent of the GDPR, giving us a right to privacy that's applicable to every single company. I don't consent to being a data subject of any part of the surveillance industry, including this oldest part calling themselves "credit bureaus".

Re: Tell HN: Equifax free credit report dark patterns

#59

Post by lolinder »

g051051 wrote: post #54
lolinder wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I understood the comment about aiding and abetting to be a reference to the fact that Equifax leaked about half of all Social Security Numbers back in 2017. For 145 million Americans the "harvested data" you refer to was data that the credit bureaus hoovered up and then failed to protect.

> Equifax leaked about half of all Social Security Numbers back in 2017. They weren't leaked , they were stolen . Does a bank "leak money" when it's robbed?

If the bank failed to apply industry-standard security techniques then yeah, I'd say the bank leaked money. The criminals are obviously the most culpable, but when you're storing more than 100 million SSNs it's not unreasonable to expect your IT department to:

* Update their dependencies within two months of a critical security vulnerability being patched (Mar 7 to May 12).

* In the event of a breach, detect it within a reasonable timeframe (76 days is not reasonable when you're the Fort Knox of financial information).

* Have a reasonably well-segmented network such that a compromise in a single user-facing web app doesn't lead to your entire network being compromised.

Re: Tell HN: Equifax free credit report dark patterns

#60

Post by hellotomyrars »

I haven’t had issues with the annual credit report process personally. The system is shitty though.

Equifax will give you a copy off your real credit report once per month if you sign up with them which is better than the other two will do. The rub though is they try as hard as possible to make you think you have to pay for it and every time you sign in you have to decline to pay.

It’s so fucked up. If we’re going to have our lives controlled by credit agencies, then individuals should be able to access their real score at any time for no cost and no bullshit. What a fucking racket.

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