Identity Theft

[Joe90uk]

On 1 Feb 2025 I received 5 letters from O2 each welcoming me to a new pay monthly account.

Nothing to do with me apart  from my name and my address used.

Official looking envelope with O2 logo and good quality paper with Pay Monthly Mobile Agreement leaflet.
Looks genuine.

Reported to O2 on 1 Feb and a fraud ticket was raised.
On Monday 3 Feb I received an email stating this (name & fraud number removed):

Subject:
    We’ve resolved your fraud report
Body: 

    Hi xxxxxx xxxxxx,
We’re just letting you know your fraud report (no: FRD-x999999) has now been resolved.

Thanks,
O2

Since then I have not received any communication from the O2 fraud team to confirm:
that the letters I received were from O2
that they are nothing to do with me
how O2's system allowed the contracts to be created
whether any other of my personal information was used

On 11 Feb 2025 I received another letter from O2; this time talking about outstanding arrears with the threat of calling in debt collector agencies.

Reported to O2 on 11 Feb.
A support ticket was supposed to be raised but I never received a notification.

Since then I have been using X.com to message O2 and I do get a response, usually just saying waiting on the fraud team.
On 18 Feb I reported again to O2 and a Fraud Report was raised and I was notified via email.
Yesterday I received an email the same as above, but with the second Fraud Report number.

No mention of whether I'm still under threat of the debt collectors knocking on my door!

Sent big message on X.com detailing the utter uselessness of O2's 'system' of dealing with this and asking for specific answers to questions that should have been sent to me when O2 'resolved' the Fraud Reports.

 I have also went information to ActionFraud, but that's pretty useless too as the form you get directed to from the Identity Theft link is about Identity Fraud and has no suitable form fields to enter anything that might help in future cases.

Clearly identity theft is not a serious problem in the UK.

[Enlli]

Thank you for the information. Sadly all we can say here is that your experience with O2 is not unique.

The fraud team will not respond with details nor say how the fraudsters go access

[gmarkj]

Might be worth getting one of the free credit reports @Joe90uk to see what (if anything) has been added to your record.

If there are suspect items you can ask for notices to be applied to your "account", as well as getting freezes applied.

Contact your bank if you think you may have given out financial information. They can help protect your account and stop transactions.
Change your account and online account passwords. Not just your O2 account. All of them.
Forward fraudulent texts to O2 for free on 7726.
Contact Action Fraud on 0300 123 2040.
Call your Virgin Media or O2 customer services number if you think somebody’s taken out a contract using your details.
Virgin Media customers can phone 150 from their landline or 0345 454 1111 from any other phone.
O2 customers can call 202 from their O2 phone or 0344 809 0202 from any other phone.
You can block the number that called you, or any number you think may be suspicious.
How to block a number:
https://www.samsung.com/us/support/answer/ANS00062352/
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201229
There are also these links to look at:
https://www.o2.co.uk/help/safety-and-security/phishing-and-smishing-advice
https://www.o2.co.uk/help/safety-and-security/unwanted-calls-and-messages
https://www.actionfraud.police.uk/