Equifax

The Federal Housing Finance Agency has proposed barring Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac from using credit scores developed by VantageScore over concern about conflicts of interest with the joint venture of Equifax, Experian and TransUnion.

Republicans on the House Oversight Committee concluded that last year’s massive data breach at Equifax was fully preventable, but stopped short of recommending new laws aimed at averting future hacks. Democrats called the final report a “missed opportunity.”

Equifax is supporting mortgage lender customer retention efforts with a new tool that predicts the likelihood that a lead will apply for a loan within the coming months.

Senators at a hearing Thursday discussed a bill establishing an online portal for consumers to monitor their credit reports free of cost.

Credit reporting firms with significant operations in New York will face new cybersecurity and registration requirements to stave off concerns related to a breach of Equifax's systems last year.

Mortgage industry vendors' earnings varied based on the effectiveness of the strategies they used to contend with origination declines and other factors.

Some speculate that the banks who do business with credit reporting agencies may be looking for alternatives after mounting concerns about their ability to keep information private. But breaking up is hard to do.

Some fear that the removal of such data from individual credit reports could lead lenders to believe a consumer is a better bet than they really are.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is among several agencies that "continue to investigate events related to" last year's Equifax brief, the credit reporting firm said in a securities filing.

Equifax, the credit-reporting firm that suffered a massive data breach last year, said it will notify an additional 2.4 million U.S. consumers that they were affected by the hack.