Ant Financial has denied using Equifax's intellectual property or trade secrets in the development of its credit rating product, blasting a Wall Street Journal report on the subject.
According to the Journal, security officials at Equifax raised fears that former employees removed a huge trove of proprietary information - including code for new products, manuals and HR files - before leaving the firm.
However, the staffer at the centre of the claims, China-born Canadian David Zou - who left Equifax for Ant to help launch the Sesame Credit system - says that he simply forwarded the confidential information to his personal email account in order to work at home.
Ant has issued a statement claiming that the WSJ story "is full of innuendo based on disjointed facts and coincidence in timing".
Continues the Chinese firm: "Ant Financial did not use Equifax intellectual property or trade secrets, including code, algorithms or methodology in the development of our credit rating product. Ant Financial has found absolutely no evidence of Equifax software, data or code having been transferred to our systems.
"We did not directly or indirectly encourage potential job applicants to obtain Equifax intellectual property or trade secrets."