It's getting ridiculous, how to stop them?
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How to stop spam calls
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Last: 4 days ago by IrishAg
Pixel Call Screening
Any method someone brings up may help by around 20%, but that's really it.
The issue for most of these spam callers are two fold:
The only data any app can use is the exact same data every major carrier has access to.
TLDR: Any "solution" you look at may improve your experience by around 20-30% for a little while, but there is not sure-fire way to block spam callers aside from White-listing numbers instead of blocking them. White-listing is the only way to truly block spam callers.
The issue for most of these spam callers are two fold:
- For the scammers, they are generally spoofing numbers. Many people who have worked at a company with a direct phone number can tell you they've at least received one call, in the last year or so, from some random person telling them to stop spam calling them. This is because the scammers are spoofing that particular number. But, in reality, that number is NOT a spam number. It is a legit number for a legit company/organization. Also, have many people can attest to calling someone only to be told by that person that their number shows up as "Spam Caller". This is because some scammer is out there spoofing that number and enough people on a particular cellular carrier have reported it as spam. When this happens, you have to fill out paperwork for each of the major carriers to submit and remove your number from the "Spam Caller" list for THAT carrier. BTW, spoofing a phone number you do not own is actually illegal and should be reported to the FCC, though there's not much they can do about it.
- The other situation comes from legit organizations like non-profits, political/campaign calls, etc. These are not really "scammers" per se, but are simply cold callers (though many still consider these spam calls). For some of these, they use a DID that is owned AND MAINTAINED by that particular organization/company. However, for a lot of these types of situations like outbound calling campaigns, they spin these up as needed. When they decide to spin these up, they get a fresh block of DID's from their carrier and display those. These numbers can be reported enough to get added to national directory of spam callers, but they will just have a new number during the next campaign, which is NOT on the registry.
The only data any app can use is the exact same data every major carrier has access to.
TLDR: Any "solution" you look at may improve your experience by around 20-30% for a little while, but there is not sure-fire way to block spam callers aside from White-listing numbers instead of blocking them. White-listing is the only way to truly block spam callers.
I get at least 10 texts and calls per day between my two lines.
I think the best way is to turn on the feature that blocks all calls not in your contacts. Unfortunately, that is not an option for me. I block them on the phone and sometimes on the Verizon call filter thing, but I know it is not really helping with the spoofed numbers.
I think the best way is to turn on the feature that blocks all calls not in your contacts. Unfortunately, that is not an option for me. I block them on the phone and sometimes on the Verizon call filter thing, but I know it is not really helping with the spoofed numbers.
I no joke get 50ish a day now, nothing on weekends. I have started messing with them and it's 100% made it worse but it's pretty fun.
With Google Fi and my pixel phone I activate the 'Maximum Protection' on the automatic AI call screener.
It automatically passes numbers stored in your contacts through and denies known span numbers. Everything else gets screened by Googles AI asking them who they are and what they are calling about. You can see the responses live and choose to answer or decline.
I absolutely love it. If you are expecting a call that you cant miss then you can turn it all the way off or select the two lower settings. Medium = screen suspicious calls & decline spam and Basic = Decline only known spam.
I keep mine at maximum unless I know I need to answer the phone for something important like mom is in the hospital again. Otherwise, I do not get ant spam throughout the day. I hear co-workers phone always going off then look at their phone and say "spam" many times a day.
It automatically passes numbers stored in your contacts through and denies known span numbers. Everything else gets screened by Googles AI asking them who they are and what they are calling about. You can see the responses live and choose to answer or decline.
I absolutely love it. If you are expecting a call that you cant miss then you can turn it all the way off or select the two lower settings. Medium = screen suspicious calls & decline spam and Basic = Decline only known spam.
I keep mine at maximum unless I know I need to answer the phone for something important like mom is in the hospital again. Otherwise, I do not get ant spam throughout the day. I hear co-workers phone always going off then look at their phone and say "spam" many times a day.
That's definitely a way to do it.
We changed all phone numbers on our company system to go through an auto-attendant first, so they have to make a selection to get to the call groups. That cut down on our spam calls at work.
We changed all phone numbers on our company system to go through an auto-attendant first, so they have to make a selection to get to the call groups. That cut down on our spam calls at work.
I will admit, I miss Pixel call screening, iPhone has something kind of like it, but it's not as good. Overall I screen every call that isn't on my contact list, and have started putting into my contacts any business (Dr office, vet, etc) that I contact regularly. There really isn't a good solution thanks to the Telco's not wanting to invest into blocking spoofed calls.
Fun fact, I got spammed from my own phone number one time. Always interesting when you receive a call from "Voice Mail".
Fun fact, I got spammed from my own phone number one time. Always interesting when you receive a call from "Voice Mail".
Google phone dialer with spam call identification turned on and then I block every number that i get called from listed as spam in here. It has cut down on my calls to maby 1-2 a day now. Its still really ****ing annoying but should die down now that elections are past.
Back in the day there was the Texas Do Not Call list. I have no idea if that still exists or if spammer tech has made it obsolete. But it actually worked pretty well back then.
My current issue with maxing out the blocked call features is that living in a small town if I get a phone call from my local area code it's almost always legit and likely someone I want/need to talk to. I didn't give a damn when I lived in Dallas and refused all calls out of principle, but if I do that here it's usually a call I want to take.
So, that means saving every local call I get as a contact if I want to go back to screening all unknown calls.
My current issue with maxing out the blocked call features is that living in a small town if I get a phone call from my local area code it's almost always legit and likely someone I want/need to talk to. I didn't give a damn when I lived in Dallas and refused all calls out of principle, but if I do that here it's usually a call I want to take.
So, that means saving every local call I get as a contact if I want to go back to screening all unknown calls.
Agree with the pixel suggestion. Almost none of them ever get to me but when I look at my call history I see 2 or 3 calls a day answered by Google AI and blocked
On iPhone, update to iOS 26.
Go to settings/apps/phone
Under "Screen Unknown Callers" select "Ask Reason for Calling".
Under Call Filtering, turn on Unknown Callers and Spam
Ai will answer the phone for you and determine whether they're legit or not. It's worked really well for me, however if you have your phone liked to your Mac, it will ring briefly and start screening which is annoying.
Go to settings/apps/phone
Under "Screen Unknown Callers" select "Ask Reason for Calling".
Under Call Filtering, turn on Unknown Callers and Spam
Ai will answer the phone for you and determine whether they're legit or not. It's worked really well for me, however if you have your phone liked to your Mac, it will ring briefly and start screening which is annoying.
I was getting a billion spam calls a day for tax payment loans, debt consolidation, etc.
Finally signed up on the do not call registry about a month ago. The calls have stopped.
You can also go into your iphone settings and choose to mute/ignore spam calls.
Finally signed up on the do not call registry about a month ago. The calls have stopped.
You can also go into your iphone settings and choose to mute/ignore spam calls.
TAMUG'04 Marine Fisheries.
I have seen a significant increase in ringless voicemails lately.
Pman17 said:
On iPhone, update to iOS 26.
Go to settings/apps/phone
Under "Screen Unknown Callers" select "Ask Reason for Calling".
Under Call Filtering, turn on Unknown Callers and Spam
Ai will answer the phone for you and determine whether they're legit or not. It's worked really well for me, however if you have your phone liked to your Mac, it will ring briefly and start screening which is annoying.
This is what I do. I also silence unknown numbers. If I know I'm expecting a call from an unknown number I turn it off for the day. If it's important they'll leave a voicemail.
I'm most annoyed by the unsolicited text messages offering to refi my VA mortgage that I have to opt out of. Why do I have to opt OUT of something I never opted IN to? Why has it become acceptable for them to bombard us with advertising without our consent? By my estimation there's about eleventy billion people that do VA refi's because I've opted out of half that number and I still get several a week. I've reached the point where I'm anti-advertising particularly by phone, text or email. And for the love of God why doesn't the Unsubscribe link for Walk Ons work? Or anyone else for that matter.
LOYAL AG said:
I'm most annoyed by the unsolicited text messages offering to refi my VA mortgage that I have to opt out of. Why do I have to opt OUT of something I never opted IN to? Why has it become acceptable for them to bombard us with advertising without our consent? By my estimation there's about eleventy billion people that do VA refi's because I've opted out of half that number and I still get several a week. I've reached the point where I'm anti-advertising particularly by phone, text or email. And for the love of God why doesn't the Unsubscribe link for Walk Ons work? Or anyone else for that matter.
I wouldn't respond to them at all, they're mostly phishing attempts to get you to respond. A lot of the random "mistaken identity" texts that get sent out are setups for specific long term scams called pig butchering. iPhone has delete and mark spam, that's the route I go for the texts these days.
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