Palisades Collection, L.L.C. AT&T WIRELESS DEBT AT&T Wireless is stating that I owe them for a cell phone account, never had a contracted cell phone account with them. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey

There are some critical things you need to do immediately.

1.  File a police report that your identity has been stolen - you will need this later to provide to creditors and collectors.

2.  Contact the three credit bureaus and have a permanent freeze put on your account due to identity theft.  You'll have to go through the process of having it lifted every time you need to apply for credit but it will halt further attempts at identity theft.

3.  Pull your credit report and for every account opened in your name that is not yours, contact the merchant and ask for the original application for credit.  This may help you find whoever is doing this.

4.   Pallisades normally picks up debt that is past the statute of limitations - really old debt.  They are one of the bottom feeder collection companies.  Write them a letter certified return receipt stating that they must provide you with proof the debt is yours and that until they do, they are to cease contacting you.  Once you have the police report, send it to them (also certified letter) as proof the debt is not your's and let them know if they pursue you, you will file a lawsuit against them. 

5.  I would consider signing up for a service such as Debix, Lifelock, or Watchdog to help you manage the security of your identity going forward.   Also some of the credit bureaus like Equifax provide a service for  monthly fee (about $15) that provides you with alerts if there are any changes to your credit.

Good luck, post back and let us know how it goes.