<prompt> Human: I remember a few years ago getting your FICO score was pretty much impossible to get unless a lender was pulling your credit. Even when you requested your three credit reports, they never included the score. These days you get your FICO score for free from all credit cards as many times as you want without penalties or additional fees. What happened that suddenly getting your FICO score is now so easy?  <response>: Because youre not the customer; youre the product. Where FICO makes most of its money is from other people wanting to know about your ability to handle money. Car dealers, landlords, insurance companies, credit card issuers, employers in some cases.And offering people their score for free is a form of marketing. Now everyone know what FICO is, so it has far better name recognition and brand equity than any other scoring agency. Case in point: People refer to FAKOs as any credit score thats not FICO, and the name implies its not as good. 