EU Agency Advises Against Using Search, Browsing History For Credit Scores

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Record, written by Catalin Cimpanu: The European Union's lead data protection supervisor has recommended on Thursday that personal data such as search queries & internet browsing history should not be used for the assessment of credit scores and creditworthiness. The recommendation comes from the European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS), an independent agency attached to the EU that advises policymakers "on all matters relating to the processing of personal data."a document published on Thursday. In addition, the agency advises that providers of financial and credit services should also not be allowed to use health data, such as cancer data, as well as any special category of personal data under Article 9 of the GDPR for the calculation of credit scores. The EDPS recommendations follow a recent blog post for the International Monetary Fund, where researchers see the possibility of using the data from your browsing, search, and purchase history to create a more accurate mechanism for determining the credit rating of an individual or business.

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