# When did the concept of credit scores come into existence? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 21, 2010, 1:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-the-concept-of-credit-scores-come-into-existence/561427 "2010-11-21T13:07:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![67java89](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/6/aeb1de/32.png) [@67java89](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/67java89)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2010, 1:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-the-concept-of-credit-scores-come-into-existence/561427/1 "2010-11-21T13:07:43Z")
At what point in history were “credit scores” created, and who thought of them? Also, who agreed on the numbers? Did financial institutions get together and come up with a number system? ---
**Author:** ![SmartAlecCat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/67e7ee/32.png) [@SmartAlecCat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmartAlecCat)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2010, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-the-concept-of-credit-scores-come-into-existence/561427/2 "2010-11-21T22:42:14Z")
> **[Secret History Of The Credit Card - More To Explore | FRONTLINE | PBS](http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/credit/more/scores.html)** > [@](#): > > Credit reporting was born more than 100 ago, when small retail merchants banded together to trade financial information about their customers. The merchant associations then turned into small credit bureaus, which later consolidated into larger ones with the advent of computerization. > > By the 1960s, controversy surfaced over the CRAs, according to Chris Hoofnagle of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, a public interest research center. Hoofnagle says the credit reports were being used to deny services and opportunities, and individuals had no right to see what was in their files. In addition, CRAs back then reported only negative financial information as well as “lifestyle” information culled from newspapers and other sources – information such as sexual orientation, drinking habits, and cleanliness. > > The controversy led to a congressional inquiry, and in 1971, Congress passed the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), which established a framework for fair information practices to protect privacy and promote accuracy in credit reporting. Consumers gained the right to view, dispute and correct their records, and CRAs began to supplement the often-bleak reports with information on consumers’ positive financial history. ---
**Author:** ![wmfellows](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c2a13f/32.png) [@wmfellows](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wmfellows)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2010, 1:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-the-concept-of-credit-scores-come-into-existence/561427/3 "2010-11-22T13:04:31Z")
> [@SmartAlecCat](#): > > [Secret History Of The Credit Card - More To Explore | FRONTLINE | PBS](http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/credit/more/scores.html) However, credit reporting and credit scores are not the same thing. I believe some American outfits - Fair Isaac? - created credit scoring systems. Anyway, arose out of credit reports and it wasn’t the banks that thought up or created either. There is not one unified approach or scoring system either. ---
**Author:** ![Philster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/13edae/32.png) [@Philster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Philster)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2010, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-the-concept-of-credit-scores-come-into-existence/561427/4 "2010-11-22T14:58:35Z")
Fair Issac’s FICO score dominated for a long time. Plus, Each agency can sell their own score and lenders can buy a score w/a report or run their own scoring model and combine other factors that are not on a credit report (income, length of time at job, etc). Mortgage scores are specific to loan type. It varies. Still, when credit scores where ignored during the whole sub-prime lending fiasco and general mortgage collapse, that pretty much did more than several billion dollar’s worth of PR for credit reporting and credit scoring. This wouldn’t be the best time in history to question credit scoring or reporting. ---
**Author:** ![Nametag](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nametag/32/406_2.png) [@Nametag](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nametag)\ **Post date:** [November 22, 2010, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-the-concept-of-credit-scores-come-into-existence/561427/5 "2010-11-22T19:08:24Z")
Fair, Isaac, and Co. was founded in 1956, and marketed their first credit scoring system in 1958. AFAICT, this is the first credit scoring system. They introduced the first behavior scoring system (for predicting credit risk) in 1975, by which time credit scoring was mainstream. FICO, while having its own models, will also produce scoring according to customer models or priorities, so there is less uniformity in credit scoring than you might think. Also, lending institutions can (and do, and many more used to) do their own credit scoring from credit reports. Credit scores are also used by insurance companies and other underwriters of various types. The credit reporting bureaus offer their own scores, etc.