Trans Union Told to Stop Sale of Private Information

Trans Union Corp., one of the nation’s largest credit bureaus, must stop selling private financial details about its customers to third-party marketers under a judge’s ruling made public Wednesday.

The judge sided with the Federal Trade Commission, which had accused Trans Union of selling information to marketing companies about the auto loans, mortgages and credit cards held by its more than 170 million customers.

The judge agreed that Chicago-based Trans Union violated the federal Fair Credit Reporting Act. It was not fined.

“They were selling information from your credit report to marketers who had no legitimate right to see it,” said David Medine, associate director for credit practices at the FTC. He called the practice “a long-standing violation of consumer privacy.”

Trans Union attorney Oscar Marquis said the company will appeal the 95-page ruling, which was made last month by an FTC administrative law judge and disclosed Wednesday. He said Trans Union doesn’t plan to change the types of information it sells to marketers.

“These lists [of customers] don’t consist of or include confidential personal information,” Marquis said. “They shouldn’t be characterized that way.”

Judge James P. Timony’s ruling doesn’t prevent companies that gather credit information from selling some details to marketers, but it requires credit reporting agencies to ask consumers whether they can use the information.

The FTC noted that the other largest companies that gather credit information, Experian Inc. and Equifax Inc., do not sell similar lists.

The ruling against Trans Union stems from a 1992 complaint by the FTC against the company, which was accused of selling detailed information about people.