FreeCreditReport.com Spoof Song
posted by Daniel Solove
I’ve blogged in the past about FreeCreditReport.com and the fact that I think it ought to be shut down. This is one of the rather obnoxious attempts by the credit reporting agencies to exploit people’s fears of identity theft as a tool to generate money.
FreeCreditReport.com is not free. You can get your free credit report at the official site, AnnualCreditReport.com.
Here’s a terrific spoof of a FreeCreditReport.com commercial. These commercials appear all over cable TV with jingles about how people’s lives were ruined by identity theft or bad credit and how all their woes could have been averted if they only used FreeCreditReport.com:
The Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) requires that credit reporting agencies “follow reasonable procedures to assure maximum possible accuracy of the information concerning the individual about whom the report relates.” 15 U.S.C. § 1681 e(b). If services like FreeCreditReport.com are really necessary to protect oneself from inaccuracies, then why wouldn’t these be required by the FCRA for free? If such services are unnecessary, then the advertisements are doubly false — trying to sell consumers a “free” service that’s not really free plus selling a service as essential and necessary yet that’s unnecessary.
As I wrote in my previous post:
The other irony is this: It is the practices of the credit reporting agencies that have put many consumers at risk for identity theft. Now, they are selling consumers protection from a problem that is at least in part their own making. It reminds me of the scene in The Godfather Part II, where the mob would rob and pillage people’s stores and then offer security protection for a fee.
Hat tip: BoingBoing
February 22, 2009 at 2:37 pm
Posted in: Humor, Privacy, Privacy (Consumer Privacy)
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Responses (7)
Don - February 23, 2009 at 8:03 pm
the commercials are hilarious although the service is not free and they get you with monthly payments. They always have a funny angle though.
A - February 24, 2009 at 11:21 am
The FTC went after Experian for this a couple of years ago. I guess it’s time to try again, or at least look into how or why companies can use the word “free” to advertise a fee-based product, as long as the fee is properly disclosed.
http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2007/02/cic.shtm
Boyd - February 24, 2009 at 12:29 pm
Esperian really is slime. Another angle they have developed is to phone businesses with telemarketing calls. It really is them as the caller ID does indeed show their phone number as listed on their web site. They called me every day (didn’t answer after the first time) insisting that they are “just verifying your business information”. When pressed the caller admitted that what they are really doing is collecting your information for telemarketing lists that they can sell. Like I said – slime.
Anon E. Moose - February 24, 2009 at 5:25 pm
The commercials are nonsense. Catchy jingle, perhaps, but nonsense nonetheless.
In one the protagonist has to take a job as a waiter in a heavily themed restaurant because of a bad credit report – aside, what’s wrong with that? I know that some employers use credit checks as part of the screening process, but if INCORRECT information tips the balance against you, there were other problems to begin with. As noted, problems suach as INCORRECT information are of the CRA’s making, not the individual’s. If the information is correct, then the service can’t help.
In another, the protagonist buys an undesirable car because of being denied for a loan due to INCORRECT information. Has this ever happened in the history of mankind? “I’m sorry sir, you don’t qualify to borrow the money necessary to buy the car you want because of negative credit information.” The response should be – WTF?!? not ‘OK, then just put me in that old overpriced beater instead. Can I get my first three tows for free?’
I can hardly beleive I spent this much time complaining about it.
ATREV - May 12, 2009 at 9:56 am
damn i agree with daniel, free credit report .com is a scam and it should be shut down, all it is is catchy jingles and funny lines that put the name of the company into you head, which is a very effective form of subliminal messageing
it should be shut down for at least wasteing peoples time, but it can’t be and won’t be…
Deeper Voice - July 20, 2009 at 9:32 pm
When pressed the caller admitted that what they are really doing is collecting your information for telemarketing lists that they can sell
BEAT MAKER - January 5, 2010 at 4:03 pm
As noted, problems suach as INCORRECT information are of the CRA’s making, not the individual’s. If the information is correct, then the service can’t help.
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