Disagree, they are hiding the fact by assuming ignorance of most users. A true “link” , would use something like OAuth to have the bank handle authentication and provide explicitly scoped subset of consumer data to Plaid. Instead they are taking the plaintext password and getting total access. Just taking that passwords itself is a security vulnerability. Google doesn’t even know your Gmail password, just the hash, but since Plaid can’t use a password hash to login, it must store your plaintext password to your financial accounts, some of THE most sensitive data. Furthemore they have access to way more data than they should rather than clearly defined scoped subsets of it.

The whole company is a privacy and security disaster. Of course it’s annoying that banks don’t provide reasonable OAuth APIs, but Plaid “disrupts” that by deceiving consumers into dangerous security vulnerabilities with their most sensitive personal data.