Fair lending is not new. Lenders have been dealing with fair lending issues and laws for decades.

I've been asked by Lenders and Brokers alike, What's the big deal with compliance and fair lending?   My Answer - Fair Lending and compliance issues/violations can close your shop.  
If fair lending was easy it wouldn't continue to be a major risk management challenge. Designing and managing a fair lending program is not easy. The rules are unchanged. What has changed are tools and the environment. Today's bankers, regulators, community groups and others have more means for identifying, tracking and analyzing patterns and practices of violations of fair lending laws than ever before. Given the regulators' mandate to refer fair lending cases to the U.S. Department of Justice where warranted, this is quite a substantial risk area for banks and other financial institutions. 
Some of the most frequent Fair Lending issues seen in prior audits are: 

• Requiring non-owner spouses to sign business loans.
• Grossing up income for some and not for others, without following a consistent practice.
• Not counting child support where the applicant has freely chosen to offer the income on the application for credit.
• Adding a hypothetical housing expense where the applicant is living with a parent or some other individual and lists no housing expense on the application.
• Aggregating married applicants' incomes, but taking the higher of the two for non-married applicants.

Examiners have also identified the attitude of management. While you may not be able to determine management's attitude, you can make sure that management understands the implications of fairness and how these impact the portfolio from a risk management perspective.