These type of agencies should have been closed down when GDPR came into effect. There is no reason they should hold such vast amounts of data on individuals in a proven insecure manner and not give the end user any choice over it.
The principle of not allowing someone to run up bad debts all over the place is understandable but there is other ways this could be done securely and without commercial companies involved. The dire consequences for some by not being allowed into the regular banking system if you were to refuse your details being held with a credit reference agency, means there is no realistic option to not agree to your data being passed to these agencies.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
