With election season in full force, you might be experiencing more robocalls than usual. We certainly have been. These weren’t political calls, though… we got rid of those years ago by registering our phone numbers on the national Do Not Call Registry. We can’t imagine why anyone would choose not to register with this website, unless you have nothing to do all day. So when the robocalls ramped up, we first checked to make sure our registration had not expired by going to https://www.donotcall.gov/ . The registration was still current, so what gives with all these calls? According to Telecommunication company YouMail, U.S. phones were plagued by 2.61 BILLION robocalls in September, more than doubling the total number of estimated monthly robocalls received in September 2015.
Spammers don’t respect the Do Not Call Registry. The technology needed to make robocalls is cheaper than ever. A $900 device can dial these calls with a spoof number, making the spammer to detect and nearly impossible to stop without some kind of technological intervention. If only a tiny fraction of people respond to a robocall scam, it makes this scheme worthwhile as a criminal enterprise.
What NOT to do about Robocalls
Don’t waste your time reporting these spam calls to the FCC via the Do Not Call page; you almost certainly won’t be able to give them enough information to stop the caller. Your best bet is to let such calls go to voicemail. But if you do pick up a spam call, don’t say anything or press buttons, even if it’s a number to supposedly be removed from their call list. Any action you take shows the spammer that there is a live potential target on the other end of the line, and will likely ramp up the incidence of robocalls.
Solutions to Robocall Spam
After 6 calls in one day, I’d had enough and I installed an app called “TrueCaller” on my Android device. It lets you see if someone you plan to call is busy or free before you start dialing. It’s more powerful and easier to use than Android’s built-in phone app. The thing we really love about this app is that it immediately identifies calls as spam, along with the number of spam reports associated with that phone number… and it hangs up for you. If you’re on an iPhone and would like to use your phone to block unwanted spam calls, you might try “Hiya,” a free app, or read about other options here.
Wouldn’t it be nice if the big telecom players could get together and stop these annoying spam calls? Well, apparently Apple, AT&T, Google, and various government officials, have formed a so-called “Robocall Strike Force.” They’re meeting in just a few days, on October 26, 2016, to find more ways to combat the problem. Time will tell if this problem will become a thing of the past. Need your own Robocall Strike Force? We can help you get rid of those annoying spam calls.
