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Quite possibly a composite key comprising name, gender, age and locale.

"87% of the U.S. population is uniquely identified by date of birth, gender, postal code." [0]

[0] https://dataprivacylab.org/projects/identifiability/paper1.p...

I would expect it's more complicated than that. I doubt that they just start over every time you move to a different city.

I seem to have slipped through these cracks easily. When I do anything that involves pulling my credit, it's a hassle because I give my correct address information, however the credit agencies have out of date information.

Tips to slip through the cracks: have a different mailing vs home address, dont apply for new loans/update work info with existing creditors over more than one job cycle, move frequently. When your credit card asks how much you make, they are doing so because the agency doesnt have good info on you and they are updating their files.

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