I don't know anyone from Apple, but I asked around to all of my Google peeps, and they all stated that Google absolutely doesn't do credit checks.

I have only actually done one interview where they asked for a credit report (and consequently the hiring manager wasn't allowed to extend me an offer based on the result, even though they tried for several weeks to make an exception).

I don't believe you that this is standard practice (although I can buy that it is "becoming more and more standard").