
Landlord service Naborly makes blacklist of tenants who missed 4/1 rent (YC '18) - Apocryphon
https://www.qpbriefing.com/2020/04/06/unconscionable-landlord-service-naborly-draws-criticism-for-creating-blacklist-of-tenants-who-missed-april-1-rent/
======
daun
If you know anyone in California who might be affected by this company please
let them know to file a complaint against Naborly. They apparently have no
idea what the laws here are, and they are also most likely in violation of
numerous other United States credit reporting laws.

Edit: Their Privacy Policy says nothing about California, and it looks like
they're most likely already in violation of California's CCPA.

Edit 2: Can't find them registered anywhere in the US as a credit reporting
agency. I guess YC is now funding companies flagrantly violating US law.

~~~
lidHanteyk
Naborly are in Ontario; they are, it sounds, flagrantly violating _Canadian_
law. A former privacy commissioner is quoted as saying that they would
investigate Naborly over these allegations.

For examples of flagrantly violating US law amongst YC's prides and joy [0],
consider examining DoorDash [1] or Airbnb [2].

[0]
[https://www.ycombinator.com/topcompanies/](https://www.ycombinator.com/topcompanies/)

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DoorDash#Criticism_and_lawsuit...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DoorDash#Criticism_and_lawsuits)

[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airbnb#Controversies](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airbnb#Controversies)

------
mabbo
> "The more data we have on what happens over the next few days is going to
> really accelerate our ability to retrain our AI systems and then help all of
> you accurately understand tenant risk moving forward into this new world,"

This is actually dumb in terms of ML, and really dumb in terms of
discrimination.

Given someone missed rent April 1st 2020, what does that tell you going
forward about their future? Does it imply they're likely to miss rent again
someday? Far less than the same data point _any other time_ before. So it's
not useful that way. So why get these data points about people?

Perhaps what it does imply is that they may have poor health? Or a disability?
Or that they don't have a university degree? Or (data still coming as to this
relationship) that they are more likely to be a specific race?

I feel that what these folks are really doing is trying to have their model
learn to predict "won't pay rent" based on a data point that implies all the
things they're not allowed to train their model to predict with due to obvious
discrimination laws.

Edit 5 minutes later: It could be innocent stupidity too. Hanlon's razor is
important.

~~~
T-hawk
There's value in the _converse_ of that data point, though, right? If someone
_made_ rent on April 1st (and maybe even more importantly May 1st), that might
be an even stronger signal that they'll continue to do so without
interruption.

~~~
phkahler
The big differentiator is going to white collar jobs. There will be others,
but it doesnt take an AI to figure out who is at risk.

~~~
tobylane
The UK government announced and started support for pay (income tax) as you
earn employees a while before support for the self employed/contractors, so
maybe the AI prefers standard salaried employment above all else.

~~~
NullPrefix
> maybe the AI prefers standard salaried employment above all else.

Is it wrong for AI to have the same biases as the general population?

------
Farfromthehood
I'm a Naborly user (landlord) in the USA. Naborly emailed repeatedly asking
for this information (I refused).

Interestingly, they asked about my tenants' payment on April 1st, not even
taking into account grace periods or such.

Also, I never signed up to receive their emails, and I've expressly asked them
to stop emailing me.

~~~
devindotcom
I'm interested in checking this out myself, if you're comfortable sharing
those communications would you contact me, devin at techcrunch dot com? I'd
just like to see how the company approached this.

~~~
JdeBP
There's (apparently) one posted in this very discussion at
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22807064](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22807064)
, notice.

------
jedberg
The big problem here is that it will be hidden. If I get a tenant applying
this fall, and I see on their credit report a "missed April rent" mark, I'm
going to ignore it for obvious reasons.

But if I get their report, it will just say "high risk" but won't tell me why,
and I'll have no way of knowing it was because of missing rent in April.

~~~
Loughla
And this is what people talk about when they mention the dangers of blindly
trusting technology. It bakes in inequality, and no one is to blame, because
it's such a complicated piece of software/hardware/code/whatever you want to
blame.

------
reaperducer
"The more data we have on what happens over the next few days is going to
really accelerate our ability to retrain our AI systems and then help all of
you accurately understand tenant risk moving forward into this new world"

AI seems to be like Javascript. It can be used for good, or it can be used for
evil. And for some reason the evil uses are always out in front.

We need to fix people so they don't think this sort of thing is OK.

~~~
crististm
People have ethics. Technology does not.

~~~
pmiller2
What ethics allow someone to think creating a "blacklist" of people who were
unable to pay rent during the largest public health crisis in a century is a
good idea? Five seconds of thought tells you this is just a way to target the
most vulnerable among us.

~~~
throwaway2048
Which is exactly the goal, every landlord would rather have ridiculously rich
tenants, and most wouldn't give a single shit about what happened to the
people who weren't.

~~~
pmiller2
Of course, but rich people are on to that scam already. I would wager that
most of those who can afford to own a home do, simply because they don't want
a landlord as a liability.

~~~
mandelbrotwurst
You'd lose that wager. There are many reasons why someone who could pay for a
home would choose not to - e.g. maybe they do not plan to their in their
current geographical area for a long enough period of time for it to be
worthwhile, the cost of renting vs. owning in their area is low, they do not
want to be responsible for maintenance, etc.

Edit: I now realize you said "most". You would not lose the wager.

~~~
pmiller2
Where is the data set on this?

------
OniBait
There's actually a TON of regulatory compliance involved with tenant screening
like this in the US.

Pretty sure that they run afoul of a few provisions in the FCRA. That they
claim to "keep reporting fully confidential and DO NOT notify your tenant that
you have reported to our system." seems really fishy to me. If a landlord
makes an adverse decision based on information in their system, the person
being screened has a legal right to view that information and dispute it.

------
tengbretson
This doesn't sound all that different from a regular credit rating.

As it relates to the financial troubles people are going through right now,
while failing to pay April 1 rent is _a_ data point, I think the uniqueness of
the situation we're in will prove it not to be a particularly useful data
point for landlords going forward.

Any landlord that overweights that in their decision-making around who to rent
to is probably doing so to their own longterm detriment.

~~~
mcguire
" _Ries said Naborly seems to be acting as a consumer reporting agency, of
which there are currently two licensed in Ontario: Equifax and TransUnion. The
industry is tightly regulated due to the personal information involved._ "

On the other hand, if it isn't acting as a consumer reporting agency, then
Naborly's operation seems like it should be strictly illegal:

" _The process has also raised concerns from the Canadian Civil Liberties
Association (CCLA), which noted that property managers in Canada are not
allowed to publish "bad tenants" lists._"

> " _Any landlord that overweights that in their decision-making around who to
> rent to is probably doing so to their own longterm detriment._ "

On the other hand, as in technical hiring, it is probably better to miss 10
good tenants rather than rent to one bad one. Right?

~~~
nokcha
> On the other hand, as in technical hiring, it is probably better to miss 10
> good tenants rather than rent to one bad one. Right?

Sure, if there is a shortage of housing and surplus of potential tenants. But
in areas where there is a surplus of housing, it might be better than fill a
unit with a tenant who has a 15% chance of not being able to pay rent (but who
is otherwise a good tenant) than leaving the unit vacant for a year.

~~~
Nacraile
> it might be better than fill a unit with a tenant who has a 15% chance of
> not being able to pay rent

That's nowhere near the worst-case "bad tenant". The worst-case scenario takes
months to evict and leaves behind tens of thousands of dollars of property
damage. There might even be some personal harassment thrown in just for good
measure. Avoiding such a tenant is absolutely worth missing some opportunities
to fill the property with a paying tenant.

Not that missing rent this April 1 is likely to tell you much about that
particular risk.

------
Hippocrates
I've been thinking about this a lot lately, starting with the public outcry
from Airbnb hosts who have had their bookings cancelled.

And then, Cheesecake Factory announced it would not pay April 1 rent on any of
its locations.

The economic fallout of this situation is something we will all bear the brunt
of. Landlords are not shielded from it. I'm not saying everyone should stop
paying rent, but the fact of the matter is, if people and businesses are not
making money for months on end, many of them will have no choice but to stop
paying.

It is unconscionable that someone thought to turn this into a blacklist which
many of the unlucky millions who have recently lost their jobs will end up on.

~~~
monkeywork
blacklist is bad yes I agree because it doesn't take situation in mind and
current situation may not indicate anything about the renter in the future.

Landlords are in a slightly different boat than say the restaurant down the
street. The restaurant isn't forced to provide services to anyone if they
aren't getting paid, most places right now have basically blocked evictions
(which is a good thing) and forcing landlords to keep people in place
regardless if they get paid or not.

Many are turning this into a protest against rent and even if they have the
means to pay are organizing rent strikes ... this is going to bite people in
the butt this summer / fall when we are out of this mess.

My not so informed opinion is that once states of emergency are lifted if you
didn't pay your rent your landlord can take you to the arbitration board in
your area ... if you can prove you were out of work then you get X months to
pay back your back rent (where X maybe equals 2x the number of months you
missed rent) and if you can't prove you were out of work you have 30 days to
pay your back rent or your out.

~~~
cgriswald
In my county, renters have to show hardship to skip their rent. Then they have
90 days to pay back any missed rent once the emergency has passed, which they
can extend, 30 days at a time, up to 180 days total (including the first 90)
if they can still show hardship.

Additionally, you cannot be evicted for lack of payment during the emergency.
After is less clear.

~~~
jlokier
In my country, the UK, it's not that good.

Eviction proceedings require 3 months notice now. That's not as good as it
sounds: It was already 2 months normally.

Notice can still be given. If you miss rent on 1st April and then the grace
period passes (which is not long), they can send you notice of eviction
proceedings that will start in 3 months.

So you can't be removed from your rented home for 3 months, but you can lose
your right to continue renting there in 3 months, caused by events happening
right now.

I don't think they can evict due to lack of payment in the emergency. Which is
just as well, because the notice period for non-payment eviction proceedings
is quite short.

However, landlords have the right to give no-reason eviction notices to most
tenants _anyway_ (I think it's mostly tenants who've been there for > 6
months). They don't need to give a reason, they just have to feel like it.

The notice period for that is now 3 months instead of the former 2 months...

------
TrackerFF
I mean, they can create these lists all they want - but in the end, it's gonna
be all noise. We're living in extraordinary times, and records like these do
not work for their intended purpose: Singling out renters with history /
patterns of delinquency.

In fact - If anything, landlords should buckle up and brace for the worst.
Trying to get someone evicted right now isn't going to do sh!t. You'll spend
MONTHS on the process, with probably no good replacement.

No, the best thing to do right now is to contact your tenants and bank(if they
own your unit), and work out a plan that works for all parties. You're both
deep in it, and there are no _good_ ways out for the next 3-4 months, only the
least terrible.

And I absolutely understand the frustration of fresh landlords that are
mortgaged to their necks with their (maybe) only rental, but that's
unfortunately how life is. Good times and bad times.

~~~
zentiggr
Not going to be noise for prospective tenants who are denied based on a missed
payment, reported without context or mitigation. As usual, this is good news
for the business end of the database+AI, screw you end of the stick for
consumers who have no access to examine, dispute, or have deleted anything the
company has collected.

Transparency again. And again. Companies need to be forced to disclose the
column names in their DBs and justify publicly why they are keeping each piece
of data.

~~~
jlokier
The database people really ought to be working on a blacklist of abusive
landlords and their properties, for tenants to avoid.

Something easily searchable and integrated into mainstream property search
sites would be great.

"[ ] Hide landlords and agents with many bad reviews from verified tenants,
verified history of no-fault evictions, official complaints and government
sanctions."

But it won't happen as long as it's the landlords who pay for the searchable
listing.

------
duxup
>"Please note that we keep reporting fully confidential and DO NOT notify your
tenant that you have reported to our system."

Brutal. They know how it looks, they just don't care to be seen being that
guy.

~~~
tejtm
If this is YC backed, can we have an ethics discussion sometime?

~~~
Nextgrid
Didn't YC back a lot of advertising/marketing crap that adds zero value to the
world beyond spamming users and tracking them?

------
avs733
If nothing else this seems like the type of data that you just don't want to
collect. The PR and potential risks of what happens next massively outweigh
any sort of value I could see this having given the situation around COVID.

Just because you can doesn't mean you should

~~~
reaperducer
It also seems like exactly the sort of information that the credit agencies
would collect and offer for sale.

As we have seen with their data breaches, they have no shame, and operating in
a black box under the shield of "trade secrets" lets them do any slimy thing
they want.

PR might bring down a small company like Naborly, but Experian and the others
are bulletproof.

~~~
downshun
Posibly off-topic but I read these often here

> (these companies) have no shame

Companies have no morals. People have morals. Thus reframing 'BigCorp is bad'
trope.

~~~
reaperducer
I think you're just splitting hairs.

It's much easier, common, and not incorrect to say, "Company A does bad
things" rather than "An important subset of the people at the head of Company
A have enacted policies that caused bad things to happen."

------
whymauri
Sad to see this from a YCombinator company.

~~~
ahelwer
Would be useful to edit the title to note it is a YC company, as is
convention.

~~~
Apocryphon
Done. Had to tweak title for character limit.

------
swiley
I’m reasonably sure this is illegal in the US (in Virginia at least.) You’re
required to process rental applications in the order you receive them and can
only reject them for certain reasons (failing a credit check for example.)
Unless a credit company starts using this it means very little here.

------
anonymousab
This seems like it would naturally be one data point and risk calculation
service in an eventual/inevitable social credit system.

Publicly trying to create that specific aspect in isolation seems to be a big
misstep, though they'd probably have a better chance with it legally in the US
than Canada.

------
FpUser
I am curious at what point all those private corporations with their never
ending data gathering, scoring, etc will accomplish that exact thing done by
China. China profiles their citizens, assigns them social score and the ones
that do not get enough points get their rights diminished. We seem to have a
lot of black lists that affect our lives. And those lists multiply and grow
bigger by the day. But of course as long as we being screwed by corporations
rather than the government it is all kosher.

------
jakelazaroff
Is this even legal? Can someone who knows about Canada's tenant protection
laws chime in?

~~~
zormino
I don't know very much and can't speak to it's legality, but I do know Canada
(at least Ontario) has very strong tenant protections, and the law tends to
land on the side of the tenants instead of the landlords. I wouldn't be
surprised if this was either illegal or if tenants could take the landlord to
court if they though they were passed over because of this.

~~~
robert_foss
My experience of Ontario tenant laws were very much the opposite. If you want
to have a terrible housing situation, moving to Toronto is a good bet.

~~~
monkeywork
The LTB [1] in Ontario is heavily leaned towards the tenant and currently is
blocking all evictions in the city regardless of payment of rent.

>COVID-19 Notice: Until further notice, the LTB is suspending the issuance of
eviction orders and all hearings related to eviction applications — unless the
matter relates to an urgent issue such as an illegal act or serious impairment
of safety.

1\. [http://www.sjto.gov.on.ca/ltb/](http://www.sjto.gov.on.ca/ltb/)

~~~
jlokier
What stops them issuing a no-fault eviction notice as soon as the COVID-19
notice is relaxed, because on their preference for a more creditworthy tenant?

~~~
Kluny
I'm in BC, not Ontario, but no-fault eviction isn't a thing here. You can
evict a tenant for reasons such as:

\- didn't pay rent

\- late paying rent at least three times

\- your family is planning to occupy the unit

\- unit is uninhabitable

\- major damage to property

\- broke the terms of the lease

Family occupancy is the most common workaround that landlords use, and it
takes a long time to make it happen. Followed by "renoviction" (leaving the
unit in disrepair until they can force the tenant out for construction). That
is also expensive and takes a long time. In any case, there has to be a
reason.

------
ekoontz
Did any of these legal (not to mention ethical) questions come up when they
applied for YC?

------
aaomidi
And people wonder why Mao has recently gained in popularity.

There's a maximum you can push people until it springs back into your face.

~~~
pmiller2
Since you mentioned Mao, I'm going to glom on here with this: what service
does a landlord offer beyond four walls, a floor, and a ceiling, that's worth
hundreds or thousands of dollars a month? They deal with maintenance issues,
sure; occasionally, they can help mediate disputes between neighbors. But,
beyond that, what justifies them getting paid simply for owning more of a
thing (housing) than they can personally use? It seems like the perfect set of
incentives to create hoarding and abuse, which is exactly what we see in the
real world.

~~~
kyboren
They offer the service of providing limited-term accommodation with no
assumption of liability for regular, small payments. Contrast this to owning a
house/condo, where the owner has an indefinite right to the property, but
assumes liability (e.g. mortgage debt, property taxes) and/or plunks down a
very large amount of cash all at once.

> what justifies them getting paid simply for owning more of a thing (housing)
> than they can personally use?

... Because they own it, and let others use it for a fee.

Let me just ask straight up: Do you believe that private property should not
exist?

~~~
hi_im_miles
> They offer the service of providing limited-term accommodation with no
> assumption of liability for regular, small payments. Contrast this to owning
> a house/condo, where the owner has an indefinite right to the property, but
> assumes liability (e.g. mortgage debt, property taxes) and/or plunks down a
> very large amount of cash all at once.

This presents a false dichotomy in my view. If a property is paid for, there's
no emergent liability set upon the owner that isn't also set by the state
(which grants them absentee property title in the first place). All of the
market mechanisms that incentivize transformation, maintenance, and occupation
of land can exist without recognizing absentee title as legitimate, enabling
people to occupy spaces they don't own without having to pay a rentier in
perpetuity.

~~~
kyboren
> If a property is paid for, there's no emergent liability set upon the owner
> that isn't also set by the state (which grants them absentee property title
> in the first place).

I mostly agree here, although there is an argument that certain torts against
property owners are not really "set by the state" except that they recognize
that without official codification and means of redress, mob justice or
personal vengeance might proliferate.

> All of the market mechanisms that incentivize transformation, maintenance,
> and occupation of land can exist without recognizing absentee title as
> legitimate, enabling people to occupy spaces they don't own without having
> to pay a rentier in perpetuity.

I'm not clear exactly what you're arguing here: The government could just own
all land but allow anyone to build on it and occupy it indefinitely for free?
Or nobody can own land they do not reside in?

There are so, so many problems here. How do you resolve disputes between rival
claimants to a building? How exactly does one move to a new place-do they sell
the house? So they retain ownership of the improvements, but not the land? If
there is no formal ownership, how are property taxes assessed? Do they just go
away? Are they based only on improvements?

If we can still own improvements, but only one per person and a person must
reside on the property to own it, people will still need an improvement to
live in, and they will still have to either buy one or rent one, changing
nothing. If we can't own improvements we don't live in, well, who will be
building new apartments and condos? You will end up with a huge market
inefficiency, with lots of low-capital people with demand for housing and lots
of capital owners who could theoretically supply that demand by building
commercial residential property but will not because they legally cannot own
and profit from any construction.

~~~
hi_im_miles
> How do you resolve disputes between rival claimants to a building?

What I am envisioning here is a world where abandoning a property grants
rights to the next person to occupy it, rather than allowing the original
proprietor to act as a permanent parasitic middleman between maintenance and
occupants. In the case of conflict, I would imagine it would carry out
similarly to how all disputes get resolved. With a state you can navigate
through a legal system, and without one you have market solutions such as
Coasian bargaining, social sanction, arbitration, etc. This doesn't mean that
someone gets to sleep in your bed if you haven't used it since you woke up,
but approaching these kinds of problems require recognizing property as the
dynamic and fluid social relationship that it is. How do you deal with a
family member eating your leftovers in the fridge?

> If we can't own improvements we don't live in, well, who will be building
> new apartments and condos? You will end up with a huge market inefficiency,
> with lots of low-capital people with demand for housing and lots of capital
> owners who could theoretically supply that demand by building commercial
> residential property but will not because they legally cannot own and profit
> from any construction.

I don't buy this. It doesn't follow that eliminating one vector for rent-
seeking eliminates all incentive to satisfy demand, as there is still profit
to be made from production!

------
unloco
Unless you can request and dispute your data, it's absolutely illegal. I'm
sure they are reaming out a loophole, but the bottom line is; A company cannot
secretly gather data used for financial decisions and just not tell you about
it.

------
Analemma_
It's becoming increasingly obvious that we're assembling our own copy of
China's social credit system, except it's privately-owned (and apparently YC-
funded). I don't see that as an improvement in any way.

------
andyjsong
Results of the survey if anyone is interested:
[https://naborly.com/blog/covid-19](https://naborly.com/blog/covid-19)

And the email that was sent after the initial request for data:

>I would appreciate a moment of your time to clarify my team’s efforts to make
a positive impact amidst the COVID-19 crisis.

Yesterday, I wrote an email asking landlords to provide information on April
rent payments. This information was intended to allow Naborly to better
support landlords and tenants and promote a mutual understanding of the severe
impact the economic shutdown is having on the rental industry. Upon
reflection, I recognize that the email was poorly worded and did not provide
sufficient context. I am deeply sorry if it suggested that Naborly or myself
were trying to do anything other than help.

Our goal at Naborly is to provide a tenant screening tool that is free from
bias, and we are firm believers that housing is a human right. For tenants, we
aim to remove traditional barriers to housing such as level of income, student
or immigration status, or prior evictions. For landlords, we provide a
screening tool that captures a tenant’s entire ability to pay rent, beyond
factors such as credit history.

As part of that goal, we have always had a reporting tool that allows
landlords to provide feedback, both positive and negative, on their tenants.
In light of the COVID-19 crisis, this information is more important than ever.
We serve over 800,000 rental units and their owners and are in a unique
position to compile information on the hardships facing tenants and landlords
alike. Having accurate information allows us to adapt our screening tools to
ensure tenants are not unfairly viewed as intentionally delinquent on their
rent obligations. Last week, we were grateful to have received survey
responses from more than 5000 tenants and 700 landlords on the difficulties
the COVID-19 pandemic has created for them, and were able to use that
information to promote a constructive dialogue between tenants and landlords.
You can read the results of our survey here.

Naborly is and will always be committed to unbiased accuracy, fairness, and
equality in our risk assessment. The notion that we are trying to hurt tenants
in this time of crisis is against everything we believe in as a team. I am
deeply sorry that the way I expressed myself did not reflect who we are as a
company and what we are trying to accomplish. It was not my intention.

Our support lines are open to all landlords and tenants to assist in
navigating the government programs available to them and to answer any other
questions they may have.

Sincerely,

Dylan Lenz

Founder & CEO Naborly Inc.

~~~
bmm6o
This seems like a huge PR risk just to have people tell you that times are
tough out there, if you aren't retaining the individual data points.

------
pfortuny
So... is data good or is it not? I mean, I am sure each and every bank,
renter, landlord, whatever has a list including those people who did not pay
on April 1.

Otherwise it would be against everybody’s interests.

What is the problem here? Intent? Ah, then the burden of the proof is greater.

------
roflchoppa
@samatlman check your boys out.

------
peter_d_sherman
Apparently Naborly is like Yelp, but about tenants, for landlords...

But that must mean there's something else like Yelp, but about landlords, for
tenants...

~~~
ahelwer
Yelp itself is roughly like this actually, a few large apartment buildings are
on there. One of the places I used to live offered us a Starbucks gift card if
we wrote a positive review.

------
mmhsieh
this is like a creepier version of Don't Date Him Girl.

------
ThrowAway1Day
This seems to be a common thread amongst YC startups. Uber, AirBNB, Instacart,
DoorDash, etc. Why do many YC companies act in such sociopathic manners?

Cash Rules Everything Around Me.

I'm throwing a party when these guys go to jail.

------
quotemstr
Hrm. Wasn't everyone saying a few years ago that "freedom to do X isn't
freedom from consequences for doing X"? How is this situation any different?

If you don't pay your rent, that's fine. Plenty of jurisdictions have
suspended rent payments. But _that_ you didn't pay your rent is a true fact.
You either did or you didn't. It's part of history. It's a feature of
objective reality. You can't stop people from remembering true facts and
talking about them. You don't make a better world by suppressing information.

~~~
bdowling
> Plenty of jurisdictions have suspended rent payments.

Many jurisdictions where I am have suspended _evictions_ for non-payment of
rent, but not the rent payments themselves. Tenants are still liable for the
rent and may be liable for additional interest.

In the U.S., it would probably be unconstitutional for a government to just
take away all the rents from landlords.

------
jimbob45
> Housing lawyer Benjamin Ries, with the University of Toronto's Downtown
> Legal Services, said his organization has sent a letter to Naborly seeking
> clarification of the company's intentions, because it seems like it's
> building an illegal "blacklist.

Is such a blacklist actually illegal or did they mistype “immoral”?

~~~
Mikeb85
It violates privacy laws so it's illegal. And like the article also says,
credit rating agencies need to be registered through the government and
consumers need to give their consent for a credit check.

~~~
bob1029
I am not so sure. Do you have to give consent for a bank to submit a charge-
off report to the various credit bureaus in case of negative balance or other
delinquency?

This sounds like the initial data collection which is a massive grey area IMO.
The _use_ of that data to make an approve/decline decision is where the
regulations start to take effect.

~~~
Mikeb85
> I am not so sure. Do you have to give consent for a bank to submit a charge-
> off report to the various credit bureaus in case of negative balance or
> other delinquency?

No, but you need to give permission for anyone to run a credit check on you.
Literally no one can legally see that info without you giving them permission
to do so. Whereas anyone can sign up for this service and see info about you.

Edit - also, banks won't give you a bad score as long as you keep paying the
minimum on all your credit products. And in my experience, their willingness
to give you a mortgage or extend credit has more to do with your income and
assets than a credit score.

~~~
bdowling
> No, but you need to give permission for anyone to run a credit check on you.

Whether that is true will depend on your jurisdiction. In the U.S. at least,
it is not true. In the U.S., a consumer report needs to be for a permissible
purpose, but it does not always require explicit permission of the consumer.
See 15 U.S. Code § 1681b,
[https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/1681b](https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/1681b).

