Equifax was founded as the Retail Credit Company by Cator and Guy Woolford in Atlanta, Georgia, as Retail Credit Company in 1899.[8] By 1920, the company had offices throughout the United States and Canada. By the 1960s, Retail Credit Company was one of the nation's largest credit bureaus, holding files on millions of American and Canadian citizens. Even though the company continued to do credit reporting, the majority of its business was making reports to insurance companies when people applied for new insurance policies, such as life, auto, fire and medical insurance. RCC also investigated insurance claims and made employment reports when people were seeking new jobs. Most of the credit work was then being done by a subsidiary, Retailers Commercial Agency.
Retail Credit Company's information holdings and willingness to sell its information attracted criticism in the 1960s and 1970s. These included that it collected "... facts, statistics, inaccuracies and rumors ... about virtually every phase of a person's life; his marital troubles, jobs, school history, childhood, sex life, and political activities." The company was also alleged to reward its employees for collecting derogatory information on consumers. This led to discrimination against queer people and people of color.
In 1970, after the company had computerized its records, which led to wider availability of the personal information it held, the U.S. Congress held hearings that led to the enactment of the Fair Credit Reporting Act. This legislation gave consumers rights regarding information stored about them in corporate databanks. It is alleged that the hearings prompted the Retail Credit Company to change its name to Equifax in 1975 to improve its image.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equifax
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