Your social media posts are now scored to determine if you deserve a good credit score. Yes, I know it sounds like Minority Report, but it is happening today.
It’s no secret that a Facebook post can get you fired from a job or prevent you from getting a job in the future. This all comes back to the first impressions, even if they are driven by social media.
Sharing your life on social media is giving insight to credit companies regarding your willingness to repay and debit. “They say a clean image on Facebook shows customers can be trusted to repay their debt, while certain pictures and posts can show they can’t be trusted”
“If you look at how many times a person says ‘wasted’ in their profile, it has some value in predicting whether they’re going to repay their debt,” Will Lansing, Chief Executive at credit rating company FICO, told the Financial Times.
See Forbes article: October 23, 2015
Your credit score can cost you money in the long run, with less favorable interest rates on car or home loans. I’m not sure there is a proven theory today that your credit worthiness can be determined by your social media likes/dislikes and posts.
Here’s the bottom line: we all create a lot of digital data, some of it is very personal some of it is fun and entertaining. But if this data is going to be available for companies to determine if you are an ideal employee or if your interest rate should be at a premium, then we as individuals need to know more about our rights and access to this data. These companies include government, retailers, insurance agencies and employers.
If this data is creating $$ for big organizations, then we as owners/creators of this data need to:
- understanding what data is being captured and how it being used
- own our individual data – if this data is valuable to companies and being used for/against us– then we should have a solid say in how, where, when this information is passed.
Remember – if the product is free (Twitter, Facebook, etc) then you are the product (via data that is created and captured this can include locations, likes, activities).