Equifax Issued Wrong Credit Scores For Millions of Consumers

Credit giant Equifax sent lenders incorrect credit scores for millions of consumers this spring, in a technology snafu with major real-world impact. From a report: In certain cases the errors were significant enough -- the differential was at least 25 points for around 300,000 consumers -- that some would-be borrowers may have been wrongfully denied credit, the company said in a statement. The problem occurred because of a "coding issue" when making a change to one of Equifax's servers, according to the company, which said the issue "was in place over a period of a few weeks [and] resulted in the potential miscalculation" of credit scores. While Equifax did not specify dates or figures, a June 1 alert from housing agency Freddie Mac to its clients said Equifax told the agency that about 12% of all credit scores released from March 17 to April 6 may be have been incorrect. Equifax wrote that "there was no shift in the vast majority of scores" and that "credit reports were not affected." But the company declined to comment to CNN Business about how people can learn whether they were among those whose credit scores were incorrectly reported -- and what recourse they may have if they were issued loans at a higher rate or denied a loan outright because of the snafu.

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