The Fourth Circuit has held that furnishers of credit data are not exempt from responding to disputes from consumers of a legal nature, disagreeing with other circuits that have excluded legal disputes from challenges:
We now turn to the district court's ruling. Recall that the district court held—as Carter-Young urged it to—that Roberts' complaint "describe[d] a legal dispute to [her] debt, rather than a factual inaccuracy underlying [Carter-Young's] report" and thus failed to state a claim against Carter-Young for violating the FCRA. J.A. 84. And the district court did so in light of decisions issued by other circuits that have distinguished between legal and factual inaccuracies. See Chiang v. Verizon New Eng., Inc., 595 F.3d 26, 38 (1st Cir. 2010); see also Wright v. Experian Info. Sols., Inc., 805 F.3d 1232, 1242 (10th Cir. 2015). However, we decline to follow that same rule and instead hold that both legal and factual disputes can form the basis of a ยง 1681s-2(b) claim, so long as they are objectively and readily verifiable. And because the district court did not have the benefit of the rule we announce today, its opinion applying a different rule must be vacated.
Roberts v. Carter-Young, Inc., No. 23-1911, 2025 U.S. App. LEXIS 6032, at *19 (4th Cir. Mar. 14, 2025)
