Phones and cellphones are pretty great, they give a person access to everyone important to them. Unfortunately, phones also give everyone access to that person. Spammers and scammers can get in touch with anyone thanks to phones, and that can be incredibly annoying. No one likes to be interrupted, especially for something that isn’t important.
Spammers are typically either telemarketers who want to sell a product or service or survey takers looking to ask some question. Scammers want to trick a person in to doing something for them. Neither group is fun to talk to on the phone.
Luckily, caller ID has enabled people to recognize who is calling before answering the phone. This saves everyone from having to talk to spam/scam phone call, but they still make the phone ring and leave annoying messages. With how frequently these calls come in, many people assume there is no escape, but that is not the case. There are things that people can do to save themselves from these obnoxious calls.
How Do They Get the Numbers?
Spammers and scammers can get a person’s telephone number through a number of means. They can get it online from public social media accounts, however this is less common with today’s privacy settings.
More often than not, these people get the phone numbers from online registries. Basically every time a person puts their phone number into a form online, they’ve given it to someone who will misuse it. This is true even if the site is a credible one, which is why it is recommended that if a person doesn’t want to receive spam calls, they should never give out phone number anywhere online.
How to Deal with the Calls
If a person is like most people, then they have already put their phone number out there a couple of times and are receiving scam/spam phone calls on a regular basis. There are a few different things that a person can do to help themselves avoid being bothered by these calls.
Most spam phone calls are either from telemarketers or surveyors. They either want to sell you something, or ask you some questions. They never call at a good time, and typically call when a person is about to sit down for a meal. Simply ignoring the calls doesn’t work, because they just keep calling back, so what to do? Well, try one of the following:
- Report the number. If a number is being extra annoying, it can be reported to Federal Communications Commission (FCC). Simply fill out a 1088G form, which can easily be done online. It is supposed to be a very effective way to stop the phone calls from occurring.
- Register your number. The FCC also has another way to protect consumers from annoying phone calls. A person can place their phone number on the DoNotCall After about a month, all calls should stop. If any spam call comes in after that month, the person can report the call to the FCC and the caller will face some heavy fines. It is worth noting that the FCC does not call and offer to put a number on the DoNotCall list. Any call claiming to do this is a scam and should be ignored.
- Create a Spam Contact. This method doesn’t prevent all scam and spam calls, but it can protect from known bad numbers. A person simply creates a contact on their phone for Spam, and anytime they receive a scam/spam phone call, they add that number to the spam contact. This way, when the number calls again, it will pop up as Spam. A person can even set a silent, personal ringtone for the contact so that it doesn’t actually ring.
- Forward to SPAM. When it comes to receiving spam/scam texts, a person can typically report the numbers to their service provider. Simply forward the message to 7726, which is the phone key combo for spam. The service provider will respond with a text asking for the guilty number, just send the number back and they will block that number from sending out anymore spam.
Keep Your Phone Quiet
No one like to be bothered, especially not repeatedly. Sadly, scammers and spammers love to use a person’s precious cellphone to get in touch with them whenever they want. Thankfully, there are steps a person can take to keep their phone safe from spammers and scammers. Taking any of the actions above can help a person keep their phone nice and quiet.
What’s the most annoying spam or scam phone call(s) that you have ever dealt with? Share it in the comments below, and tell everyone how you dealt with the problem.
