Anybody getting an absolute ONSLAUGHT of spam calls?
Anybody getting an absolute ONSLAUGHT of spam calls?
I work for a mental health research study and often have to warm call people who expressed interest to book them in for a screening with us.
Finally encountered a Google AI response the other week and got scared and confused so I just hung up and sent an email 🥲
Brace yourself, because it’s going to get a lot worse.
I had to get a new number a couple of years ago. That “fixed” the issue for a long while.
I was able to get some cheap numbers on VOIP so now I give those out to businesses that require a phone number, so that I can kill them if the spam calls start up again. It helps quite a bit. I know some people also use Google Voice to emulate what im talking about.
Honestly, most people dont even call mean anymore, they just txt or video call.
Here’s my tip, for Lemmy hopefully it will never get so popular as to not work any more.
Answer the phone for unknown numbers, don’t say a g-d thing, just listen. Let them address you first.
If they ask for you by name go ahead and respond, if they call back answer with a generic “hi” greeting, don’t let them have your voice or name before you know who they are and what their business is.
A robot will mark your number as a “dead line” and not call you again.
A person will either be trying to reach you (and know who you are) or trying to reach a living person, and not waste their time with an unresponsive line.
I hardly ever get spam calls. Today, I got a call from a government robocaller and a call asking for someone else whom I’m pretty sure had my number over five years before me. I thought these were legit but now, reading the comments, I’m not so sure.
People are way too willing to give out their phone numbers. So many apps and websites require a phone before ever signing in. I will not use any service that requires a phone number.
Because so many things rely on phone numbers now, when I got my new number in 2020 I lost access to a number of things.
2FA SMS verification can be spoofed so it’s not a secure method.
The only spam calls or messages I get are from government reps. Apparently “for government use” is not illegal and it’s practically impossible to get taken off the list. If anyone has a tip for this, please let me know.
I did this and regretted it.
Many professional services withhold their number for obvious reasons. Turns out my doctor was trying to contact me and couldn’t.
For those on iOS you don’t need an app to do this.
You can go to settings -> apps -> phone -> silence unknown callers.
This will send them straight to voicemail and the call will show in the recent calls list.
Just to throw this in. If you use this, check your voicemails.
I often have to call customers to check ambiguities in their orders and people just dont return calls. Our contracts clearly state that in the event that you cant be contacted we arent responsible for any errors.
What phone os do you have?
For me android automatically blocks 90% of spam calls nowadays. I can see them in the phone history, but my phone don’t ring for them.
I don’t get too much of them. I recently installed Spamblocker from F-droid. It uses a list of reported spammers to warn you that a call might be spam. And it works.
It also helps that I don’t have much family or connections outside the country, so if I see a weird countrycode I already know it is BS.
And I just don’t get called very often. Luckily I am in Europe, which means that if I leave my number with a company so they can call me, they cannot sell that number to anyone else.
I think over the last 5 years I’ve had maybe 6 calls? Something like that. I immediately know what is up and don’t even pick up.