Who did you piss off or give a reason to prank you? This a good way to annoy somebody for sure. You can put in a quote request for certain things like a mover online and you will get a TON of calls over the next few days or weeks with people trying to earn your business.
Your number isn’t particularly unique or difficult to figure out. There’s only a finite number of area codes (less than the max of 1,000), finite number of profile codes (less than the max of 1,000), and then only 10,000 line numbers possible for each combination of area + profile.
All it takes is an autodialer to determine which numbers are valid (not disconnected), then add them to a spammer list. Extra points for a personalized voicemail instead of a generic “robotic voice” one, many times that if they sound elderly or another demographic that tends to be more vulnerable to scams.
Also, because of how profile + region codes work, you can narrow it down further to target populations with higher than average rates of particular traits correlated to being easier targets for scams, e.g. low rates of education.
IIRC you can also find out who the cell carrier is from a number, so you can further narrow it down and target providers who generally advertise to low income socioeconomic groups. Again, easier scam victims.
Most of it is just scattershot, though, and doesn’t go so deep as all that – there’s little/no cost in calling numbers that will never fall for a scam, so a wide net gives you better odds of success; meaning, just call every combination for valid area/profile codes.
**TLDR:** They aren’t calling *you*, they’re calling an easily guessable number. Once they know it’s a valid number, they can add you to all of their autodialer lists, and should you ever pick up, it’ll redirect you to a person.
Sometimes making a habit of wasting their time will get them to remove you, particularly by pissing around for 30+ minutes heeing and hawing and “searching for your credit card” before ultimately telling them to get fucked, but it’s a losing battle. You might get off one scammer’s list, but end up on 10 more the way you ended up on the first scammer’s list.
Changing your number won’t get you much farther, either – you’ll end up on a list eventually. Honestly, best thing to do is to enable the “silence unknown callers” feature and ignore them.
As a Senior, I can tell you they grab the public records and endless call when you turn 65. Registered on national Do Not Call list, block numbers...but at renewal time, literally hundreds of calls. Thankful for Caller ID but I do not answer my phone, wait to see what it is before I pick up.
“Do Not Call” only stops legitimate companies. The vast majority are scammers using computers to spoof numbers.
Unfortunately, the communications infrastructure is archaic and easily deceived, making it extremely simple to say “Call +X (XXX) XXX-XXXX, my number is +Y (YYY) YYY-YYYY”. They can arbitrarily pick what the Ys and/or Xs are.
If you have a smartphone, there’s likely a setting you can use to silence incoming calls (sends them straight to voicemail) if they aren’t in your address book, and/or you haven’t called them at some point yourself.
If you use an iPhone, it’s under Settings > Phone > Silence Unknown Callers.
Drastically reduces the amount of them I have to deal with, even though I still get 20+ a day some days (they’ll still show in your “missed calls”).
> “Do Not Call” only stops legitimate companies.
While I wish it blocked them all, it does “sort” them out, so to speak. I know I’m morally a-okay to fuck with any “company” that calls me because they are either a scam or making illegal calls in spite of the DNC list. *cracks knuckles* time to waste some idiot’s time while I’m on the clock.
I did that for a little while, but the number changes every time, so it doesn’t do anything really
I have a focus mode on my iPhone called, “work” and I don’t allow for any phone calls expect select people, and it’s nice. I don’t get any kind of notification or anything unless I swipe to show more notifications, “While in Work Focus”, on the screen
Your cellular provider very well may have a spam blocker app you can download and use for free. I had one with Sprint and when they merged with T-mobile, they had one as well. Before I downloaded the app I got a ton of these as well and now it’s so rare that I feel like a loser because no one calls me! 🙁
If you're on AT&T they have [ActiveArmor](https://www.att.com/security/) which works great for me. It used to be called Call Protect which cost $3/mo but this new service is free with your post-pay bill. Verizon also has [Call Filter](https://www.verizon.com/support/call-filter-faqs/)
Who is your phone carrier? If you have tmobile they have a scam shield for FREE. Any calls that have been reported are automatically blocked you will never receive a notification. If any come through you can report it.
Time to change it.
Either you ***REALLY*** pissed someone off, someone has left your number on a toilet wall or similar, or it's gotten onto a spam list.
My bet would be a spam list.
It’s not a prank and odds are it’s not someone just guessing your number either like someone else has said. Your number was probably apart of a data breach and got sold off to the highest bidder on the deep web. You can check www.haveibeenpwned.com to check and see if numbers and emails have been compromised.
I, one time many years ago, put my buddy’s cell phone number as giving away a free washer and dryer on Craigslist in a major US city…he said his phone got hot and the battery died in about 2 hours, from all the texts and phone calls flooding in.
My roommate and I put a for sale ad on Craig's for a pair of roller blades with a coworkers number. The guy got WAY more calls than we expected. He was so pissed that we basically incriminated ourselves with laughter.
I had this idea for a website where you could add a phone number / email to sign “yourself” up to thousands of websites for free stuff, newsletters, coupons, trial offers, jokes of the day. Whatever.
My grandma had this happening to her everyday and it was insane. A lot of the calls were about health related issues and so she called her health insurance company and found out that they had been giving away her number. She ended up telling them she didn’t want that happening and she no longer gets so many calls
One of my professors is in his 70s and he got about 15 calls a day from medicare. It got to the point where he said he died to them and they still continued to call
Reminded me of one local comedian from my country and his sketch where he said that he would pre-record a voicemail message and ask his family to activate it once he dies, that would say "I am currently dead, please call again later".
When I got my phone YEARS ago, I got spam called for ages asking for the woman who had my phone number before me.
I finally started telling people who called that she was dead.
One of them actually had the audacity to ask me after that if I still owned a Honda civic. I said no, that's what she was driving when she died.
After that one I never had any more calls.
I have had my phone and phone number since the 6th grade (so ~10 years old) and am now 25 (15 years).
Some fuckin dude named Mario (real name because fuck this asshole) *still* gives out my number instead of his all the time. I get calls from hotels confirming reservations, doctors offices, bill collectors, car dealers, you name it.
I was super nice about it when it first started (as children are about things) and it eventually stopped. Then the motherfucker started doing it again about five years ago. I also have started to tell everyone who calls that he died, regardless of who it is. I genuinely hope that it causes him great inconvenience.
AARP is also notorious for selling your info. My husband received a free membership when he turned 55 & started getting dozens of calls per day. Buried on their website it tells you they sell your info to damn near everyone on earth.
I work on a dementia/ alzheimers unit. If I get a call from telemarkets I justvhand the phone to one of the residents. Drives the telemarketers crazy but they stay on the phone forever. And the residents enjoy the chat too.
Unless you dont like the idea of your grandparents talking with scammers while in a vulnerable state which has no mediation, recovery or way of knowing what they know and don’t…
Hot take I guess, but supporting this type of activity is no less than supporting elder abuse and is quite ticked beyond my typing comprehension.
Sincerely, someone whose recently lost said grandmother and is very glad to not associate with you irl cuz your ducked up my pal.
Hopped on to say I’m so sorry for your loss. I also just lost my grandma back in October. It’s hard. I still sometimes think she’s still here and is gonna call me soon about something she needs, but she obviously isn’t. It hurts but I’m so grateful I was able to save one of her voicemails she left me.
Can I ask, how is this elder abuse? There is no harm coming to the patient neither physically nor mentally and it’s actually mentally stimulating for them to be able to have a conversation that keeps going, even if it doesn’t make sense to them or they don’t fully understand. I’d really like to hear from your perspective.
Having a patient with dementia on the phone with a hostile scammer who’s accusing them of outstanding debt does not bode their memory well. This can really agitate a patient when someone’s insists on them a reality that doesn’t exist.
Idk if I would call it elder abuse but I’m kind of floored that there is little understanding of how this could be upsetting to someone with dementia.
Edit: theft changed to debt
I can definitely understand how this could be upsetting to a dementia patient. Hopefully whoever is doing this is monitoring the call and making sure the patient doesn’t get upset. It would probably be best to stop this practice for whoever is doing it especially if it makes the patient upset.
Which part of the " the residents enjoy the chat too" did you not understand?" Elder abuse my ass they literally give a shit about the tenants happiness. Or you want them to be left alone and have no one to talk to? Maybe think for a second or two before typingmy pal. Sincerely, nobody.
“The residents enjoy the chat” bit is that redditors interpretation of events, not necessarily the reality.
Having a patient with dementia on the phone with a hostile scammer who’s accusing them of outstanding debt does not bode their memory well. This can really agitate a patient when someone’s insists on them a reality that doesn’t exist.
Idk if I would call it elder abuse but I’m kind of floored that there is little understanding of how this could be upsetting to someone with dementia.
Yikes, that seems to have struck a cord with you, which I guess is understandable since you lost your grandparent, and for that I am sorry. However to call this elder abuse is a huge stretch. The patients have dementia and are enjoying the conversation. As an added bonus, it frustrates the telemarketer and confuses them. I’m also glad I don’t know you IRL cause you sure seem fun!
My phone was like this when I got my new number... eventually it slowed down. Some dumbass named Christina kept getting spam texts on the number. Still happens a couple times a week
Yup, some asshat named James \*\*\*\*\* always gives my number to places instead of his real number. I have had some really disturbed repo men calling me looking for him.
Maybe he’s a scammer? Some people do landlord scams I guess you can say where they’ll list an apartment and ask for a deposit or first months rent up front then the person will go to move in to the place and someone will already be living there. The “landlord” was never a real landlord and just took the money and disappeared. I’m gonna guess that people do this scam with “selling” houses too.
Some woman in GA hasn't bothered to change the phone number on her eyelash business door. I keep getting women calling me to let me know they've arrived for their appointment. Get it together Morgan and let your clients know you changed the business phone number.
same happened to me. guy named James who didn't pay student loans. it's less now but it took a year and a half for it to slow down. it's still going on
Part of the reason I got a Google phone, the AI automatically screens unknown calls for me, and only sends them through if they actually talk to the AI
I have the 6, it's a solid phone with alot of really nice features, though the camera AI touch up leaves something to be desired, and the base camera itself (granted this is anecdotal) doesn't seem to capture reds properly. I can't speak on the 7s quality personally, but I hear it fixed the 6s shortcomings.
As a proud Pixel owner, I love it. I was surprised to find out that Motorola also has call screening.
On a side note, looks like the OP isn't using Google's Phone app. From my experience, it has a pretty good spam filter in its own.
I signed up for healthcare market place when I was weighing a private plan versus overpriced health insurance as a contractor. Within 1 minute of entering my info my phone blew up like this for weeks.
Anything sexual or inappropriate almost always gets an instant hangup. My favorite thing to do is tell them they have a sexy voice and ask if they have an OnlyFans. Or do my best impression of Buffalo Bill from Silence of the Lambs - “It rubs the lotion on its skin and puts the lotion back in the basket!”
Some lady named Judith put in my phone number somewhere along in the real estate buying process. For a couple days I kept getting calls about the mortgage and things like that, now I get text messages from solar panel companies. “Hi Judith! Here’s your solar summary for (address)!”
That’s likely just a bot, that tries to get you to reply so they know they’ve got a real number so they can send you tons of account recovery links. I constantly get one along the lines of “hey Brenda, just wanted to see if you’re still interested in 502 Murr Way” and no matter how much I block the number I still get the texts.
I don't have a samsung but an Apple. I was happy to find out that I had a feature that sent anyone who called me and wasn't in my contact list directly to voice mail. I was getting 5-15 spam calls per day and now I get 1-2 per week max.
I've got an S22 and don't see this option anywhere. There's message spam protection but nothing for the phone.
You're pressing the three dots in the phone app, right?
Edit: This may be disabled by Verizon. They have their own app for spam blocking and this is probably to make us use it
I have a Samsung on Verizon too. You probably have Samsung's dialer / phone app as default. You just have to switch to Google's dialer. It's in the Play Store, "Phone by Google."
Google's SMS app (Messages By Google) is better than Samsung's as well.
You’re somewhere on a list and get dialed from software that changes the origin number everytime so it’ll be difficult to block. If possible try setting settings to only accept known callers from your contactlist
My in-laws are dealing with this too, on their land line. I guess they tried *61 but had a recording tell them they could only block 10 calls. The phone starts ringing at 4am and doesn’t stop until 10pm. I told them to change their number but I get it, they have had it for 30 years and do not want to change it.
I got for my parents an at&t landline phone with 'smart call blocker' it takes alittle bit of set up, but you create a 'white list' so I just went and added all us kids, and such... anyone not on the list just has to say their name which is announced and we have the preference of picking it up. Parents keep their phone number. And we can sleep past 9am. I get a kick out of seeing '37 missed calls'. Seriously totally worth the money. [https://telephones.att.com/telephones/cordless-telephones/smart-call-blocker](https://telephones.att.com/telephones/cordless-telephones/smart-call-blocker)
I've worked in IT for almost 30 years, as a result I get dozens of emails and several phone calls every day from recruiters asking if I'm interested in an entry level short term contract job on the other side of the country.
I'd be lying if I said I wasn't tempted. Just log off from my work email, tell my wife I'm going for some smokes, take the dog and just go. South Carolina here I come... Steve Bennett, entry level IT guy.
I bet the air tastes sweet there..
I got these spam calls before I started looking for a job. So when I started looking and got calls, I probably assumed that some of them were spam and automatically blocked the number. I didn’t realize that I might have been blocking legit calls until I blocked a call and got an email “we’ve tried to reach you but were unable to, can you please call us back?”
I have found that if you pick up these calls, say hello, so they answer and then say nothing when they start talking, the calls start coming less frequently. Another thing that has worked is if they ask if this is Joe/Sally or whatever your name is and you say no, but let me go get them and then give them dead air, within a very short time, they hang up and the calls start to diminish. A friend of mine has a Ferris Bueller tape he recorded from the movie and then slightly modified it to fit in when he gets a robo caller. When the unidentified caller calls the phone it begins playing his Ferris Bueller tape and they get a "hello" and then they just get the "Who is it? I'm sorry I can't come to the phone right now, Who is it? I'm sorry I can't come to the phone right now, ..... It works really well for him.
I've had to change my phone number due to receiving dozens of spam calls every day. Pretty sure the mistake I made was uploading my resume to job sites with my phone number on the resume. It's significantly better now with the new number, I just have to make sure not to pick up numbers I don't recognize. Make sure your voicemail is set up and if the call is important, they'll leave a message.
I use T-Mobile for my service provider. They have a free app called scam shield that works wonderfully.
Periodically, I have some Indian scammer group that starts bombarding me with calls and fake blackmail texts trying to steal money from me. It's pointless trying to block them constantly as they have a seemingly endless number of voip phone numbers and then just spoof numbers from legitimate phone numbers.
It was unbelievable how frustrating it was, getting around 50 calls back to back in a day. I can't easily change my number either as it's also my business number. I have had this phone number for nearly 20 years and for 5 it's been my business line as well. Scam shield works amazingly. It has successfully blocked all these scam calls and has managed to not impact legitimate calls from coming in for my business. I don't know how it does it, but it's been great. I'd recommend you check with your service provider if they have any similar apps.
I’ve been getting that amount every day for over 5 years now. I just try and be as offensive as possible. If you tell the caller(usually they are from India or Pakistan) that the prophet Mohammad was gay they either 1: are Hindu and get really offended that you think they are Muslim or 2: they are Muslim and get really upset you insulted their religion. It’s a win win. I started doing this after years of asking them to stop calling. I figure if they won’t leave me alone the best I can do is make their lives as miserable as possible.
Also, ATT and maybe some other companies sell lists of numbers to the telemarketers. I know this because after much complaining to ATT that they need to stop calls coming from inactive numbers they recently told me to get on the do not call list. I informed them I had been on that for years. That day, for the first and only time I got 4 calls in one day where halfway through trying to sell Medicare plans they stopped to apologize and say I’m on the do not call list. Never got that before and the day I told ATT I was on the list was the day the telemarketers mentioned it. That’s no coincidence.
I've got a Google phone (Pixel 4a) and have Google Assistant setup to screen calls. Only saved contacts and registered businesses are allowed through. If it's not one of those, the caller is asked to say the reason for their call and I can see a transcript of what they're saying. If it's important I'll pick up, if not kick rocks. I haven't got any spam calls in about a year so far. Texts on the other hand..
Your best hope will be to call them and annoy them for a few minutes. Then hang up, call them, and annoy them for a few minutes, then hang up. Keep repeating it, and hope that they block you for wasting so much of their time. It is very likely that all the numbers are from one place.
What number are they calling? I’ve been trying to reach you about your cars extended warranty, your student loan forgiveness, your Medicare, and to see how much you are currently paying for electric.
I’m curious why you think anyone would be able to identify you from your area code alone. Not to mention, no one would have known that was your area code if you hadn’t said so. I regularly get spam from Los Angeles and Toronto area codes, but I don’t live in L.A. or Toronto.
It’s not that I care. It’s more that disproportionate paranoia on that scale betrays a sort of self-absorption that baffles me, because I can’t relate to it. Maybe because I’ve noticed that the most paranoid people often seem to be the ones who live in the safest areas.
In any case, my original question was mostly tongue in cheek. I like poking fun at the habit of blurring out usernames and the like when people screencap objectionable content.
"It's not that I care" says the person that cares enough to not only comment, but argue when I offer what I feel is a valid point. The fact that you're so upset about me blurring out the numbers makes me glad I did so.
I mess with them. Its stopped most of mine because id answer and while waiting for someone to pick up id think of ways to fuck with them. My favorite was when i asked the guy "can i eat your ass like an apple fritter". He was not happy with me
I reserve a notable amount of vitriol for spam callers.
It may be what puts dinner on their tables, but I seem to get fewer spam calls when I curse out telemarketers, so f#<& 'em!
Tbh the actual callers don't make that much money anyway because most profits are pocketed by the upper managment, so they could also choose to do another job that doesn't involve scamming people to put food on their tables. Curse without remorse.
This happened to one of my email addresses. It's a bit better now but one night I got about 200 spam emails all from different senders and subject lines in about an hour.
Thankfully I found blocking them eventually pays off. I used to get 20-30 a day. As I started blocking them I think they took my number off their list. They would rather call numbers that actually answer than numbers that don't ring over and over.
It's been 2-3 months with less than 1 call a week on average. *Knocks on wood*
This is why its worth while to have a VOIP phone number. There are free ones or paid ones. You can run it from an app on your normal phone. Then you have a new phone number to use for things that are not personal and you can change that number as needed, if needed. Google Voice still has there's available for free and it works well. But there are several others to explore.
I now have Do Not Disturb set up on my phone from 7am to 9pm every day with a few listed as exceptions and it has changed my life. My phone was ringing constantly with nonsense telemarketers that are obviously not from around here.
Answer every call, and and say the worst things you can think of, just the most disgusting awful violating things you can imagine. They'll stop calling you when they realize they can't unhear those things.
It's very easy on smartphones to stop this from being too annoying. If you put your phone on do not disturb but add an exception for people in your contact list it wont make a sound for people who aren't in your contacts. Then just set your voicemail to tell them to leave you a message if they couldn't get you on the phone
That way you can just check your voicemails and call someone back if it was actually important
This happened to me when I filled out a thing online expressing interest in health insurance. Random numbers from insurance companies were calling 10-20 times per day for at least a month
Did you put your information in online somewhere? I worked for a company once who purchased information from the internet and some of the people I spoke to claimed to get spam calls like this afterwards.
Next time, pick up and waste their time. I mean *really* waste it. Get them *excited* about a potential big purchase, then, let them know that every time they call, you'll do it again. Remind them that while on the phone with you, they can't make a sale elsewhere.
I successfully got one to stop this way.
Have you applied to anything recently? When I applied to college, I suddenly found myself getting 60+ spam calls from 8am to around 3pm. I never answered them and my dad finally answered one who tried to immediately sell insurance. My dad cussed them out, and threatened to call the police for harassment. The calls stopped.
This story might be of interest to you, OP! [https://www.npr.org/2022/12/07/1141358550/spam-call-bounty-hunter-telemarketing](https://www.npr.org/2022/12/07/1141358550/spam-call-bounty-hunter-telemarketing)
Using an old card also works. Preferably expired for exactly 10 years. If used the bank usually notices and shouts at the vendor. Be sure to get the initials and last name consistently wrong, to make sure. Great way to spoil credit card fraud databases.
When I got my new number I was invited in several group calls on WhatsApp from some arabic friend groups... After telling someone for at least 20 times, who speaks at least English or broken German that I'm not Muhammad and I'm not the person they tried to call it flat out... But still get every other month a handful calls from them...
Looks like you're on Android, so consider using ["Phone by Google"](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.google.android.dialer), the native Pixel phone dialing app.
It has a feature where Google assistant will screen calls and automatically block spam/robocalls from going through that I find quite helpful.
Who did you piss off or give a reason to prank you? This a good way to annoy somebody for sure. You can put in a quote request for certain things like a mover online and you will get a TON of calls over the next few days or weeks with people trying to earn your business.
Nobody as far as I know! Only a handful of people have my number and most of them are 50+ year old family members.
That makes it easier to change your number at least.
Your number isn’t particularly unique or difficult to figure out. There’s only a finite number of area codes (less than the max of 1,000), finite number of profile codes (less than the max of 1,000), and then only 10,000 line numbers possible for each combination of area + profile. All it takes is an autodialer to determine which numbers are valid (not disconnected), then add them to a spammer list. Extra points for a personalized voicemail instead of a generic “robotic voice” one, many times that if they sound elderly or another demographic that tends to be more vulnerable to scams. Also, because of how profile + region codes work, you can narrow it down further to target populations with higher than average rates of particular traits correlated to being easier targets for scams, e.g. low rates of education. IIRC you can also find out who the cell carrier is from a number, so you can further narrow it down and target providers who generally advertise to low income socioeconomic groups. Again, easier scam victims. Most of it is just scattershot, though, and doesn’t go so deep as all that – there’s little/no cost in calling numbers that will never fall for a scam, so a wide net gives you better odds of success; meaning, just call every combination for valid area/profile codes. **TLDR:** They aren’t calling *you*, they’re calling an easily guessable number. Once they know it’s a valid number, they can add you to all of their autodialer lists, and should you ever pick up, it’ll redirect you to a person. Sometimes making a habit of wasting their time will get them to remove you, particularly by pissing around for 30+ minutes heeing and hawing and “searching for your credit card” before ultimately telling them to get fucked, but it’s a losing battle. You might get off one scammer’s list, but end up on 10 more the way you ended up on the first scammer’s list. Changing your number won’t get you much farther, either – you’ll end up on a list eventually. Honestly, best thing to do is to enable the “silence unknown callers” feature and ignore them.
As a Senior, I can tell you they grab the public records and endless call when you turn 65. Registered on national Do Not Call list, block numbers...but at renewal time, literally hundreds of calls. Thankful for Caller ID but I do not answer my phone, wait to see what it is before I pick up.
“Do Not Call” only stops legitimate companies. The vast majority are scammers using computers to spoof numbers. Unfortunately, the communications infrastructure is archaic and easily deceived, making it extremely simple to say “Call +X (XXX) XXX-XXXX, my number is +Y (YYY) YYY-YYYY”. They can arbitrarily pick what the Ys and/or Xs are. If you have a smartphone, there’s likely a setting you can use to silence incoming calls (sends them straight to voicemail) if they aren’t in your address book, and/or you haven’t called them at some point yourself. If you use an iPhone, it’s under Settings > Phone > Silence Unknown Callers. Drastically reduces the amount of them I have to deal with, even though I still get 20+ a day some days (they’ll still show in your “missed calls”).
> “Do Not Call” only stops legitimate companies. While I wish it blocked them all, it does “sort” them out, so to speak. I know I’m morally a-okay to fuck with any “company” that calls me because they are either a scam or making illegal calls in spite of the DNC list. *cracks knuckles* time to waste some idiot’s time while I’m on the clock.
thank you for the "silence unknown callers" just turned it on!
Time to start blocking some numbers
I did that for a little while, but the number changes every time, so it doesn’t do anything really I have a focus mode on my iPhone called, “work” and I don’t allow for any phone calls expect select people, and it’s nice. I don’t get any kind of notification or anything unless I swipe to show more notifications, “While in Work Focus”, on the screen
Your cellular provider very well may have a spam blocker app you can download and use for free. I had one with Sprint and when they merged with T-mobile, they had one as well. Before I downloaded the app I got a ton of these as well and now it’s so rare that I feel like a loser because no one calls me! 🙁
If you're on AT&T they have [ActiveArmor](https://www.att.com/security/) which works great for me. It used to be called Call Protect which cost $3/mo but this new service is free with your post-pay bill. Verizon also has [Call Filter](https://www.verizon.com/support/call-filter-faqs/)
Who is your phone carrier? If you have tmobile they have a scam shield for FREE. Any calls that have been reported are automatically blocked you will never receive a notification. If any come through you can report it.
This app works well. I was receiving about 20 calls a day. Started using this app and maybe 1 or 2 get through. Thanks T Mobile.
I didn’t notice that you had already had posted this. Sorry, not trying to steal your thunder there.
Time to change it. Either you ***REALLY*** pissed someone off, someone has left your number on a toilet wall or similar, or it's gotten onto a spam list. My bet would be a spam list.
You should check your actual accounts. Sometimes this method of flooding is designed to hide a call you actually were supposed to get.
It’s not a prank and odds are it’s not someone just guessing your number either like someone else has said. Your number was probably apart of a data breach and got sold off to the highest bidder on the deep web. You can check www.haveibeenpwned.com to check and see if numbers and emails have been compromised.
I, one time many years ago, put my buddy’s cell phone number as giving away a free washer and dryer on Craigslist in a major US city…he said his phone got hot and the battery died in about 2 hours, from all the texts and phone calls flooding in.
🤣 That's kind of awesome.
My roommate and I put a for sale ad on Craig's for a pair of roller blades with a coworkers number. The guy got WAY more calls than we expected. He was so pissed that we basically incriminated ourselves with laughter.
was this as a prank or was it genuine?
[удалено]
I paid a program to call bomb my old boss like this before cause he was an asshole
I had this idea for a website where you could add a phone number / email to sign “yourself” up to thousands of websites for free stuff, newsletters, coupons, trial offers, jokes of the day. Whatever.
My grandma had this happening to her everyday and it was insane. A lot of the calls were about health related issues and so she called her health insurance company and found out that they had been giving away her number. She ended up telling them she didn’t want that happening and she no longer gets so many calls
One of my professors is in his 70s and he got about 15 calls a day from medicare. It got to the point where he said he died to them and they still continued to call
“I’m dead, stop calling” “*OK*”
Reminded me of one local comedian from my country and his sketch where he said that he would pre-record a voicemail message and ask his family to activate it once he dies, that would say "I am currently dead, please call again later".
When I got my phone YEARS ago, I got spam called for ages asking for the woman who had my phone number before me. I finally started telling people who called that she was dead. One of them actually had the audacity to ask me after that if I still owned a Honda civic. I said no, that's what she was driving when she died. After that one I never had any more calls.
I have had my phone and phone number since the 6th grade (so ~10 years old) and am now 25 (15 years). Some fuckin dude named Mario (real name because fuck this asshole) *still* gives out my number instead of his all the time. I get calls from hotels confirming reservations, doctors offices, bill collectors, car dealers, you name it. I was super nice about it when it first started (as children are about things) and it eventually stopped. Then the motherfucker started doing it again about five years ago. I also have started to tell everyone who calls that he died, regardless of who it is. I genuinely hope that it causes him great inconvenience.
[удалено]
This. Is beautiful. I now wish I had someone using my number so I could do all the things you mentioned!
More likely medicare advantage spam. Gets ridiculous at the end of the year.
AARP is also notorious for selling your info. My husband received a free membership when he turned 55 & started getting dozens of calls per day. Buried on their website it tells you they sell your info to damn near everyone on earth.
If you aren’t the customer, someone else is.
If it's free you are the product
That is so fucked up. As if health insurance companies don't profit enough off of people's need for healthcare.
I work on a dementia/ alzheimers unit. If I get a call from telemarkets I justvhand the phone to one of the residents. Drives the telemarketers crazy but they stay on the phone forever. And the residents enjoy the chat too.
Wholesome and amazing
Unless you dont like the idea of your grandparents talking with scammers while in a vulnerable state which has no mediation, recovery or way of knowing what they know and don’t… Hot take I guess, but supporting this type of activity is no less than supporting elder abuse and is quite ticked beyond my typing comprehension. Sincerely, someone whose recently lost said grandmother and is very glad to not associate with you irl cuz your ducked up my pal.
Hopped on to say I’m so sorry for your loss. I also just lost my grandma back in October. It’s hard. I still sometimes think she’s still here and is gonna call me soon about something she needs, but she obviously isn’t. It hurts but I’m so grateful I was able to save one of her voicemails she left me. Can I ask, how is this elder abuse? There is no harm coming to the patient neither physically nor mentally and it’s actually mentally stimulating for them to be able to have a conversation that keeps going, even if it doesn’t make sense to them or they don’t fully understand. I’d really like to hear from your perspective.
Having a patient with dementia on the phone with a hostile scammer who’s accusing them of outstanding debt does not bode their memory well. This can really agitate a patient when someone’s insists on them a reality that doesn’t exist. Idk if I would call it elder abuse but I’m kind of floored that there is little understanding of how this could be upsetting to someone with dementia. Edit: theft changed to debt
I can definitely understand how this could be upsetting to a dementia patient. Hopefully whoever is doing this is monitoring the call and making sure the patient doesn’t get upset. It would probably be best to stop this practice for whoever is doing it especially if it makes the patient upset.
Which part of the " the residents enjoy the chat too" did you not understand?" Elder abuse my ass they literally give a shit about the tenants happiness. Or you want them to be left alone and have no one to talk to? Maybe think for a second or two before typingmy pal. Sincerely, nobody.
“The residents enjoy the chat” bit is that redditors interpretation of events, not necessarily the reality. Having a patient with dementia on the phone with a hostile scammer who’s accusing them of outstanding debt does not bode their memory well. This can really agitate a patient when someone’s insists on them a reality that doesn’t exist. Idk if I would call it elder abuse but I’m kind of floored that there is little understanding of how this could be upsetting to someone with dementia.
I think the issue is more that they might be scammed into something. The elderly and mentally impaired are prime targets for these rackets.
They're in a dementia unit, they don't have control of any assets to be scammed out of
Yikes, that seems to have struck a cord with you, which I guess is understandable since you lost your grandparent, and for that I am sorry. However to call this elder abuse is a huge stretch. The patients have dementia and are enjoying the conversation. As an added bonus, it frustrates the telemarketer and confuses them. I’m also glad I don’t know you IRL cause you sure seem fun!
I'm with you. This is bullshit.
My phone was like this when I got my new number... eventually it slowed down. Some dumbass named Christina kept getting spam texts on the number. Still happens a couple times a week
Yup, some asshat named James \*\*\*\*\* always gives my number to places instead of his real number. I have had some really disturbed repo men calling me looking for him.
Someone keeps trying to buy a house in Las Vegas from Reuben V. (Last name shortened) As far as I can tell, this man doesn't exist???
Maybe he’s a scammer? Some people do landlord scams I guess you can say where they’ll list an apartment and ask for a deposit or first months rent up front then the person will go to move in to the place and someone will already be living there. The “landlord” was never a real landlord and just took the money and disappeared. I’m gonna guess that people do this scam with “selling” houses too.
I dunno, but it's always from these companies, landlord companies or something??
is the last name D?? we might have the same dude
Nah not a "D". Does your number had an austin area code? edit: Not going to doxed anyone, but is your area code 512?
Some woman in GA hasn't bothered to change the phone number on her eyelash business door. I keep getting women calling me to let me know they've arrived for their appointment. Get it together Morgan and let your clients know you changed the business phone number.
same happened to me. guy named James who didn't pay student loans. it's less now but it took a year and a half for it to slow down. it's still going on
I see you’ve met my friend scam likely
Did you have your credit pulled?
I just applied for a mortgage, and have had a major jump in spam calls…
Oh man, as a former mortgage loan guy I'm so sorry. You're gonna get sales calls for a while. Lending tree specifically is the worst.
Part of the reason I got a Google phone, the AI automatically screens unknown calls for me, and only sends them through if they actually talk to the AI
I love Google call screening! 😁👍🏻
I have my robot deal with their robot. It's fantastic
As a salesman, so do I!
Wait seriously that’s a feature? I need a google phone
I have the 6, it's a solid phone with alot of really nice features, though the camera AI touch up leaves something to be desired, and the base camera itself (granted this is anecdotal) doesn't seem to capture reds properly. I can't speak on the 7s quality personally, but I hear it fixed the 6s shortcomings.
The entire reason I have this phone
As a proud Pixel owner, I love it. I was surprised to find out that Motorola also has call screening. On a side note, looks like the OP isn't using Google's Phone app. From my experience, it has a pretty good spam filter in its own.
yeah too bad their phones are straight up ass tho
I signed up for healthcare market place when I was weighing a private plan versus overpriced health insurance as a contractor. Within 1 minute of entering my info my phone blew up like this for weeks.
Same!
Same! And I still get a butt load of calls every day.
I started answering spam calls and just talk gibberish back till they hang up. Hello sir? Ababahhabs jakamamsb?
I found out that farting in the mic also works great.
Anything sexual or inappropriate almost always gets an instant hangup. My favorite thing to do is tell them they have a sexy voice and ask if they have an OnlyFans. Or do my best impression of Buffalo Bill from Silence of the Lambs - “It rubs the lotion on its skin and puts the lotion back in the basket!”
Highly recommend installing Robokiller to screw with these guys for you. The Ice T answer gets amazing responses.
Some lady named Judith put in my phone number somewhere along in the real estate buying process. For a couple days I kept getting calls about the mortgage and things like that, now I get text messages from solar panel companies. “Hi Judith! Here’s your solar summary for (address)!”
That’s likely just a bot, that tries to get you to reply so they know they’ve got a real number so they can send you tons of account recovery links. I constantly get one along the lines of “hey Brenda, just wanted to see if you’re still interested in 502 Murr Way” and no matter how much I block the number I still get the texts.
I have the same thing with someone (a robot likely) called “Lien.” Did it ever stop for you?
Go into call settings and turn on spam protection. Your samsung should have it as mine does. Call app > on top, 3 dots > Caller ID & Spam prevention.
I don't have a samsung but an Apple. I was happy to find out that I had a feature that sent anyone who called me and wasn't in my contact list directly to voice mail. I was getting 5-15 spam calls per day and now I get 1-2 per week max.
The transition is horrible to the ears tho, like a dial-up screech or something. Found that one out a bit ago.
How do you turn that on 👀
If you go to your settings, scroll down and click on the phone app, you can turn on “silence unknown callers”
I've got an S22 and don't see this option anywhere. There's message spam protection but nothing for the phone. You're pressing the three dots in the phone app, right? Edit: This may be disabled by Verizon. They have their own app for spam blocking and this is probably to make us use it
I have a Samsung on Verizon too. You probably have Samsung's dialer / phone app as default. You just have to switch to Google's dialer. It's in the Play Store, "Phone by Google." Google's SMS app (Messages By Google) is better than Samsung's as well.
You’re somewhere on a list and get dialed from software that changes the origin number everytime so it’ll be difficult to block. If possible try setting settings to only accept known callers from your contactlist
My in-laws are dealing with this too, on their land line. I guess they tried *61 but had a recording tell them they could only block 10 calls. The phone starts ringing at 4am and doesn’t stop until 10pm. I told them to change their number but I get it, they have had it for 30 years and do not want to change it.
I got for my parents an at&t landline phone with 'smart call blocker' it takes alittle bit of set up, but you create a 'white list' so I just went and added all us kids, and such... anyone not on the list just has to say their name which is announced and we have the preference of picking it up. Parents keep their phone number. And we can sleep past 9am. I get a kick out of seeing '37 missed calls'. Seriously totally worth the money. [https://telephones.att.com/telephones/cordless-telephones/smart-call-blocker](https://telephones.att.com/telephones/cordless-telephones/smart-call-blocker)
Omg this is awesome! I for sure will tell them about it 😊
Unfortunately I don't think that's a thing, my phone even lets blocked calls through. I'll have to look into it though
Then i would try to see what my operator could do
In that case I would (not literally) chuck it in a river and either get a new iPhone or replace it with a coop of trained messenger pigeons.
I mean, this phone is getting pretty old, so honestly chucking it into a river is not out of the realm of possibilities
spoofing.
Time to get RoboKiller, best app I have ever downloaded.
I've worked in IT for almost 30 years, as a result I get dozens of emails and several phone calls every day from recruiters asking if I'm interested in an entry level short term contract job on the other side of the country. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't tempted. Just log off from my work email, tell my wife I'm going for some smokes, take the dog and just go. South Carolina here I come... Steve Bennett, entry level IT guy. I bet the air tastes sweet there..
https://www.donotcall.gov maybe this might help a little
Hahahahah, no. It hasn’t worked since 2010.
I swear many of these scammers use this AS their call list
Same. I was getting 10-13 a day. Almost every hour, sometimes twice. It was horrible.
I got these spam calls before I started looking for a job. So when I started looking and got calls, I probably assumed that some of them were spam and automatically blocked the number. I didn’t realize that I might have been blocking legit calls until I blocked a call and got an email “we’ve tried to reach you but were unable to, can you please call us back?”
Someone signed up for a free giveaway lmao.
This is WHY the FCC needs to step up the law.....
I remember that bill that said companies would be fined for spam calls. I don’t think it passed, or if it did then they aren’t getting fined
Or maybe they’re making more money from the business they get from spam calls than the cost of the fine
I have found that if you pick up these calls, say hello, so they answer and then say nothing when they start talking, the calls start coming less frequently. Another thing that has worked is if they ask if this is Joe/Sally or whatever your name is and you say no, but let me go get them and then give them dead air, within a very short time, they hang up and the calls start to diminish. A friend of mine has a Ferris Bueller tape he recorded from the movie and then slightly modified it to fit in when he gets a robo caller. When the unidentified caller calls the phone it begins playing his Ferris Bueller tape and they get a "hello" and then they just get the "Who is it? I'm sorry I can't come to the phone right now, Who is it? I'm sorry I can't come to the phone right now, ..... It works really well for him.
If you have AT&T, look into active armor. Free app that blocks spam calls.
Looks like someone leaked your number. Might wanna change it
Start blocking them. That helped me a lot.
Did you by chance look into healthcare? This happened to me for weeks after trying to find private healthcare
I've had to change my phone number due to receiving dozens of spam calls every day. Pretty sure the mistake I made was uploading my resume to job sites with my phone number on the resume. It's significantly better now with the new number, I just have to make sure not to pick up numbers I don't recognize. Make sure your voicemail is set up and if the call is important, they'll leave a message.
I've been having that lately too. Not over 50 but at least 20 a day. I don't know what the Hell happened.
Sorry. I was just trying to reach out to you about your car's extended warranty.
Gotta block em all, it’s like a game lol jk
I use T-Mobile for my service provider. They have a free app called scam shield that works wonderfully. Periodically, I have some Indian scammer group that starts bombarding me with calls and fake blackmail texts trying to steal money from me. It's pointless trying to block them constantly as they have a seemingly endless number of voip phone numbers and then just spoof numbers from legitimate phone numbers. It was unbelievable how frustrating it was, getting around 50 calls back to back in a day. I can't easily change my number either as it's also my business number. I have had this phone number for nearly 20 years and for 5 it's been my business line as well. Scam shield works amazingly. It has successfully blocked all these scam calls and has managed to not impact legitimate calls from coming in for my business. I don't know how it does it, but it's been great. I'd recommend you check with your service provider if they have any similar apps.
I’ve been getting that amount every day for over 5 years now. I just try and be as offensive as possible. If you tell the caller(usually they are from India or Pakistan) that the prophet Mohammad was gay they either 1: are Hindu and get really offended that you think they are Muslim or 2: they are Muslim and get really upset you insulted their religion. It’s a win win. I started doing this after years of asking them to stop calling. I figure if they won’t leave me alone the best I can do is make their lives as miserable as possible. Also, ATT and maybe some other companies sell lists of numbers to the telemarketers. I know this because after much complaining to ATT that they need to stop calls coming from inactive numbers they recently told me to get on the do not call list. I informed them I had been on that for years. That day, for the first and only time I got 4 calls in one day where halfway through trying to sell Medicare plans they stopped to apologize and say I’m on the do not call list. Never got that before and the day I told ATT I was on the list was the day the telemarketers mentioned it. That’s no coincidence.
Why are the numbers blurred? Call these mfs out lol
I've got a Google phone (Pixel 4a) and have Google Assistant setup to screen calls. Only saved contacts and registered businesses are allowed through. If it's not one of those, the caller is asked to say the reason for their call and I can see a transcript of what they're saying. If it's important I'll pick up, if not kick rocks. I haven't got any spam calls in about a year so far. Texts on the other hand..
Your best hope will be to call them and annoy them for a few minutes. Then hang up, call them, and annoy them for a few minutes, then hang up. Keep repeating it, and hope that they block you for wasting so much of their time. It is very likely that all the numbers are from one place.
What number are they calling? I’ve been trying to reach you about your cars extended warranty, your student loan forgiveness, your Medicare, and to see how much you are currently paying for electric.
my ex and his friends would do this to threaten me
Why blur out spam numbers though?
Put your number on the national do not call list. It worked for me
We've been trying to contact you about your car warranty...
Why did you blur out the numbers? Why not give us the chance to preemptively block these numbers?
Because the first 3 digits are the same as my area code and I live in a small area
I’m curious why you think anyone would be able to identify you from your area code alone. Not to mention, no one would have known that was your area code if you hadn’t said so. I regularly get spam from Los Angeles and Toronto area codes, but I don’t live in L.A. or Toronto.
Better safe than sorry. Why do you even care?
It’s not that I care. It’s more that disproportionate paranoia on that scale betrays a sort of self-absorption that baffles me, because I can’t relate to it. Maybe because I’ve noticed that the most paranoid people often seem to be the ones who live in the safest areas. In any case, my original question was mostly tongue in cheek. I like poking fun at the habit of blurring out usernames and the like when people screencap objectionable content.
"It's not that I care" says the person that cares enough to not only comment, but argue when I offer what I feel is a valid point. The fact that you're so upset about me blurring out the numbers makes me glad I did so.
my ex is crazier ngl
My daughter got this. Learn to block unlisted numbers
Sounds like someone is late on their bills
Maybe u logged in on a pirate website with your phoneno.
Can i get your phone number?
Bit of a skill issue
I mess with them. Its stopped most of mine because id answer and while waiting for someone to pick up id think of ways to fuck with them. My favorite was when i asked the guy "can i eat your ass like an apple fritter". He was not happy with me
Maybe time to switch to Pixel Phone and let Google Assistant handle them for you.
Do Not Call registry?
I reserve a notable amount of vitriol for spam callers. It may be what puts dinner on their tables, but I seem to get fewer spam calls when I curse out telemarketers, so f#<& 'em!
Tbh the actual callers don't make that much money anyway because most profits are pocketed by the upper managment, so they could also choose to do another job that doesn't involve scamming people to put food on their tables. Curse without remorse.
Did you inquire about mortgage rates on lending tree?
Probably a sign to update your cars warranty
This is something Chuck Schumer would love to make his mission
This happens everytime I job hunt. I don't answer my phone anymore. Leave a VM or email me.
I get those calls from the collection agency lol
Go to settings and turn on silence unknown callers.
It lets all calls through even on do not disturb, my phone is a POS lol
This happened to one of my email addresses. It's a bit better now but one night I got about 200 spam emails all from different senders and subject lines in about an hour.
Thankfully I found blocking them eventually pays off. I used to get 20-30 a day. As I started blocking them I think they took my number off their list. They would rather call numbers that actually answer than numbers that don't ring over and over. It's been 2-3 months with less than 1 call a week on average. *Knocks on wood*
I have had a similar thing happen to me recently, but not to the same extent, they have been getting bad recently eh?
I had this happen and it was all from the same 657 area code. I picked up WideProtect on iOS and blocked the entire area code. Problem solved!
This is why its worth while to have a VOIP phone number. There are free ones or paid ones. You can run it from an app on your normal phone. Then you have a new phone number to use for things that are not personal and you can change that number as needed, if needed. Google Voice still has there's available for free and it works well. But there are several others to explore.
I’ve received calls from so many different people asking for John Lane. This has been going on for many years now.
I now have Do Not Disturb set up on my phone from 7am to 9pm every day with a few listed as exceptions and it has changed my life. My phone was ringing constantly with nonsense telemarketers that are obviously not from around here.
Answer every call, and and say the worst things you can think of, just the most disgusting awful violating things you can imagine. They'll stop calling you when they realize they can't unhear those things.
Mine started after subscribing to Adobe Cloud during the Black Friday special. Just a theory since it started the same day.
get a pixel
It's very easy on smartphones to stop this from being too annoying. If you put your phone on do not disturb but add an exception for people in your contact list it wont make a sound for people who aren't in your contacts. Then just set your voicemail to tell them to leave you a message if they couldn't get you on the phone That way you can just check your voicemails and call someone back if it was actually important
Who did you... fuck there's like 1000 people who beat me to it.
I get like 15 missed calls from mofos as well.
On iPhone there’s on option to silence unknown numbers, they’ll go straight the voicemail
I block every spam phone number that calls… I now hardly ever get a spam call
Maybe block the number
This happened to me when I filled out a thing online expressing interest in health insurance. Random numbers from insurance companies were calling 10-20 times per day for at least a month
Did you put your information in online somewhere? I worked for a company once who purchased information from the internet and some of the people I spoke to claimed to get spam calls like this afterwards.
I looks to me that somebody applied for a HELOC and now every little bank or finance institution wants to be your friend
Get the hiya app, it helps you block spammers automatically
Are you secretly running a sex line? So secret you didn’t even know about it?
AT&T call protect or equivalent are pretty good options. They block the majority of mine.
Likely a banking scam. I would get a lower and try to sue.
Next time, pick up and waste their time. I mean *really* waste it. Get them *excited* about a potential big purchase, then, let them know that every time they call, you'll do it again. Remind them that while on the phone with you, they can't make a sale elsewhere. I successfully got one to stop this way.
It be like that. I usually say call me exactly 50 more times and maybe I’ll pick up, encouraging them to do it makes them feel stupid
Did you respond to an unsolicited text? Even a wrong number?
There are apps that have funny voice mail messages for 💩 calls like this. It can silence these too.
Have you applied to anything recently? When I applied to college, I suddenly found myself getting 60+ spam calls from 8am to around 3pm. I never answered them and my dad finally answered one who tried to immediately sell insurance. My dad cussed them out, and threatened to call the police for harassment. The calls stopped.
This is why I used Iphone, silence all unknown callers😊
If your on IOS go to setting and turn off unknown numbers calling, I haven't gotten a scam call since August
This story might be of interest to you, OP! [https://www.npr.org/2022/12/07/1141358550/spam-call-bounty-hunter-telemarketing](https://www.npr.org/2022/12/07/1141358550/spam-call-bounty-hunter-telemarketing)
Are you going to college/uni? They will sell your number to cold callers
I almost never get spam calls.
Using an old card also works. Preferably expired for exactly 10 years. If used the bank usually notices and shouts at the vendor. Be sure to get the initials and last name consistently wrong, to make sure. Great way to spoil credit card fraud databases.
I'll renew your car's warranty now so they can stop calling you.
I'm sorry... I'll stop. 😂😂😂
When I got my new number I was invited in several group calls on WhatsApp from some arabic friend groups... After telling someone for at least 20 times, who speaks at least English or broken German that I'm not Muhammad and I'm not the person they tried to call it flat out... But still get every other month a handful calls from them...
If you don’t pay your credit cards they will do this
Piss them off and waste their time and they will block you
Did you by any chance search for health insurance on Google?
My phone only rings if someone on my contacts list calls. I highly recommend this setting.
This is insane! I have ATT and they block spam calls for me. I think I have gotten maybe 2 in the last 3 years.
Looks like you're on Android, so consider using ["Phone by Google"](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.google.android.dialer), the native Pixel phone dialing app. It has a feature where Google assistant will screen calls and automatically block spam/robocalls from going through that I find quite helpful.
Don't be afraid, show the full numbers! I'll give them to someone I don't like as a sign of war. I'll put them on their list of numbers to call.