>  MP> I pulled a copy of a credit report and can see that the
>  MP> application apparently had my home address on it.  The
>  MP> difference is the phone number is not mine and is from
>  MP> outside of my area.  I suspect they are trying to get that
>  MP> phone number linked to my public record so that, in
>  MP> future, they can use it to gain access to other
>  MP> information.

> Maybe they think they can convince the credit card company that
> they never received your card and offer a different address
> claiming that you have moved?

I don't think it is just the card, though.  They may not even care about
the card.  Lots of fraud rings are into the long game now.  So they have
someone's personal info.  They will do something like apply for a credit
card but change one bit of info... in this case, the phone number.  Once
that phone number gets proliferated into the public record as attached to
that stolen identity, they now have control of one of the keys that places
ask for to allow account access.

Every call I made yesterday while tracking this down, they would ask me to
verify a phone number (which, having worked in the industry, I know they
are likely bouncing off a list compiled by a data warehouse like Lexis
Nexis).  If I give them a phone number that is linked to me, they then
texted me my access code to continue the call or web interaction.

Some of the calls I made were to have that phone number removed from my
credit report as it had alreday proliferated there.

Once that phone number proliferates, a fraudster can use that number to
receive access codes and then change all sorts of information to take over
the identity.  Because the phone number doesn't belong to the real person,
they won't likely know what is going on until it is too late.

Until this time last year, I worked with an anti-fraud team.  Your amateur
and part-time fraudsters are still about getting a credit card and spending
as much money as quickly as they can before they are detected.  Big time
fraud rings have moved onto the long game as assuming identities is where the
money really is.

Mike

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