Who 'owns' your Fico scores?

[Anonymous]

I've asked this elsewhere and received no response, maybe someone here can answer this. I pay for access to credit reports, but who actually 'owns' them. I have records with DMV, IRS, the military, I even have an FBI file (nothing bad, thankfully). Heck, I even have a Secret Service file. But I don't own them. A lot of people scream and shout because someone messed up their scores, but as long as what's reported is accurate, there's little anyone can do about it. I didn't pay Fair Isaac to design their scoring formula, and I don't pay the cra's to amass and interpret my credit information. I call it 'my score' and I'm just as angry as the next person when something's wrong. Your cards and credit limits are 'given' to you at the whim of the issuer, but when it comes right down to it, who own's your scores?

[marty56]

Each CRA owns the data since they are the ones keeping track of it.  FICO owns  the rights to the scoring algorithm which the 3 CRAs use.

[haulingthescoreup]

Your scores don't even exist unless and until someone pulls them, so it's not like they're something tangible. So as marty said, the only thing that can be owned is the information on the reports/ records maintained (ha) by the CRA's.

When you pull your FICO's, they aren't crunched by myFICO, who does not maintain records. myFICO just sends the request on to the CRA's, who use their unique versions of their commissioned FICO formulas to create your scores, based on the info that they have on hand.

[Anonymous]

I feel cheesy but,

the most important thing you own is your ability to change your FICO score.

[marty56]

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@Anonymous wrote:

I feel cheesy but,

the most important thing you own is your ability to change your FICO score.

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Perhaps a little but oh so true.