An Auckland Powershop customer did the right thing by checking her credit report after the company said she was in arrears, even though she was up to date with her payments.

The Privacy Commissioner is currently reviewing the Credit Reporting Privacy Code. The principal focus of the review is the operation of the two amendments made to the Code made five years ago to allow positive credit reporting to be introduced into New Zealand.

There are three main credit reporting agencies in New Zealand: Centrix, Veda and Dun & Bradstreet. According to Veda, a thousand people a year challenge the information held in their credit files. This is a right people have under the Privacy Act – to see information agencies hold about them, and request a correction if it’s wrong.

The issue over whether a person’s past should continue to be discoverable online is one of the big privacy debates of our time. Although the concept of the ‘right to be forgotten’ has been around since 2006, it gained momentum in 2014 when the European Court of Justice agreed that a Spanish man, Mario Gonzalez, had the right to get Google to “break the link” to online information about his past financial difficulties.

In the recent decision Taylor v Orcon Ltd, the Human Rights Review Tribunal ordered a telecommunications company, Orcon, to pay $25,000 in damages to Mr Taylor. This case sends a strong reminder to agencies to check the accuracy of personal information before using it.