Mobile Phone/Identity Fruad

beefturnmail

I signed up for a new mobile phone contract with Vodafone over the internet. When I got the confirmation e-mail I noticed that they had missed off the first line of my address

I e-mailed them and got a reply telling me I had to ring a number to correct this (0870 but used saynoto0870.com and found a freephone number).

When I rang them, I also checked with them that the mobile phone was still being delivered to my work address (I had requested this on-line and was quite surprised I could do this at the time), and the operator said "no, as you're a new customer, we have to deliver it to your home address for security reasons".

I thought fair enough, but I checked and said "It will definitely be delivered to my home address will it?" and she said "Yes". When I said "Why did the on-line system let me put in another address then?", I just received a ""dunno".

I thought it was just a glitch in the on-line system, but I have just received the mobile phone at work today! It was handed over with no request for ID or anything. So if someone had stolen my identity, they could just order a mobile phone on-line in my name and get it sent to another address - and then rack up masses of phone-bills all in my name and I wouldn't be any the wiser until I received the bill. A slightly frightening thought!

I am amazed by this seemingly massive security flaw - how can this be allowed?