Your example wouldn't have happened though, at least in Sweden. Registration into the bad lender registry doesn't happen automatically, and the government knows

Your example wouldn't have happened though, at least in Sweden. Registration into the bad lender registry doesn't happen automatically, and the government knows your address after you moved, so they would be able to inform you what's going on. There are benefits and drawbacks of course. I ended up in the registry for not paying my taxes on time (I had challenged a tax authority decision and thought I did need to pay it while the investigation was ongoing, so it was my fault). For this I was on the registry for 3 years and it was seriously annoying, similar to having a bad credit score in the US I can imagine. There was nothing one can done about this other than waiting for you to be removed from the registry after 3 years. The benefit is that that the system is completely transparent, and is not based on random metrics such as an account being closed or whether or not you have any loans at all (the last part is bizarre to me, you should be rewarded for being debt free, not punished).