An agency which collects and sells information about the creditworthiness of individuals. A credit reporting agency does not make any decisions about whether a specific person should be extended credit or not. Instead, it collects information that it considers relevant to a person's credit habits and history, and uses this information to assign a credit score to indicate how creditworthy a person is. Prospective creditors purchase credit reports from credit bureaus about specific individuals, and then they use this information to decide how much credit, if any, to extend to the individual. also called credit bureau.

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