Financial institutions are using all available data to improve estimations of creditworthiness. The Horror!
I don't support the implicit assumption that it is better to err on the side of leniency when it comes to credit provision. Inadequate information was as responsible as lack of oversight for causing the financial crisis. Racial discrimination is also a flawed analogy -- that was a case of using traits that had no bearing on credit risk to calculate a deliberately false appraisal, whereas using data on online activity is far more akin to the practice of requiring bank statements.
Granted, mistakes could very likely be made, but so far the author presents no evidence that using such information is any worse than other means of estimating credit.
I don't support the implicit assumption that it is better to err on the side of leniency when it comes to credit provision. Inadequate information was as responsible as lack of oversight for causing the financial crisis. Racial discrimination is also a flawed analogy -- that was a case of using traits that had no bearing on credit risk to calculate a deliberately false appraisal, whereas using data on online activity is far more akin to the practice of requiring bank statements.
Granted, mistakes could very likely be made, but so far the author presents no evidence that using such information is any worse than other means of estimating credit.