1. A method of operating a data collection and analysis system comprising: an exchange computer receiving customer identification data associated with a customer; the exchange computer applying a quantitative analysis algorithm with the customer identification data, the quantitative analysis algorithm determining whether the exchange computer has received an amount of customer identification data sufficient for the customer to be uniquely identified; if the quantitative analysis algorithm passes, then the exchange computer sending the customer identification data to a linking service computer; the linking service computer applying a qualitative analysis algorithm with the customer identification data, the qualitative analysis algorithm determining if the customer identification data is sufficient for the customer to be uniquely identified; if the qualitative analysis algorithm passes, then the linking service computer accessing a customer database to retrieve from said customer database a customer record set associated with the customer identification data, the customer record set comprising a plurality of account information records, each of the account information records comprising account login data suitable for logging into an associated database; the linking service computer sending the customer record set to the exchange computer; the exchange computer storing the customer record set; and the exchange computer using the account login data from each of the account information records from the customer record set to communicate with a remote database associated with the account login data and retrieve customer information from each of the remote databases.