In the days before the internet, spam usually consisted of junk mail or telephone calls to your landline. These spam attempts started to somewhat die down once the internet became mainstream, but they were quickly replaced by spam emails.
As people have become better equipped at dealing with spam in general, the newest trend in spam focuses on SMS text messaging. Although not as intrusive or disruptive as a phone call, spam texts are still highly annoying to deal with on a frequent basis.
Fortunately, there are plenty of options available for anyone trying to block these irritating texts and keep them from popping up on your messaging app.
Why Are You Receiving Spam Texts?
Before going into the various ways that you can block or reduce the number of spam texts that you receive, it’s important to know why you are receiving them in the first place.
Most of the common reasons won’t be your fault and are largely out of your control. However, you should be aware of the different ways that spammers can get your number and information:
Your Data Was Sold by a Website
It’s not exactly a secret that most social media websites track your online activity and data. What might be surprising is that they will often sell this information to advertisers for a profit.
If your phone number is public or connected to any websites online, it’s most likely going to end up in a marketing company database.
You Called an 800 or 900 Number
These numbers are typically toll-free so calling them doesn’t result in any fees. However, dialing a number with one of these prefixes will result in the Automatic Number Identification (ANI) system recording your number.
The ANI system will store your number and even match it to other digital data connected to you as well.
You Gave Out Your Number
There are plenty of apps, programs, and memberships that require an active phone number in order to complete your registration. Although a lot of these various entities will protect your number and data, there are plenty that will not.
You should take caution with who you are giving your number out to as the information might end up in the hands of a spammer either intentionally or by accident.
Random Bad Luck
Phone numbers are a finite resource and there can only be about 7.92 million phone numbers per area code at the very most. In reality, the list is far lower and spammers know it. They will often set up bots or programs that will randomly call or text every single possible phone number combination.
It’s not as hard as it may sound and doesn’t take that much time either. It’s possible that your number just randomly appeared on such a program and will continue to be bombarded with spam until you take action to stop it.
How To Block Spam Texts
Regardless of how your number might have fallen into the hands of spammers, it’s time to do something about it. You are far from being the only person that experiences these daily annoyances and lots of other people that are also fed up.
The people are so sick and tired that there have been several new pieces of legislation passed to try and stop these spam attacks. However, it will take some time before these laws will have an effect on spam and not all countries have adopted them yet.
Until your government can find a way to shut down spam for good, it’ll be up to you to protect yourself.
Do Not Reply
This is less of a prevention tactic and more of a tip to prevent further problems. Legitimate businesses will often ask you to sign up for promotional texts so they can try to continue doing business with you. If you want these texts to stop then you would simply text “STOP” in reply.
Some of the more clever spammers have started to use that tactic in order to test if a number is active. Once you reply “STOP”, they will become much more likely to flood your number with spam texts.
Unless you are absolutely certain that you are replying to a legitimate business, do not reply to any texts.
Report Them To You Phone Carrier
Just about every phone service provider has some kind of way to block spam. One of the easiest ways to block a number and help to fight back against spam is to report it.
All you have to do is copy and forward the text that you received to the number 7726 which spells out “SPAM” on your phone. The service is free of charge and will not only help you avoid spam texts in the future, but it will help others avoid the irritation as well.
Block The Number
Whether you are using an iPhone or an Android, you have the ability to block specific numbers. The process isn’t particularly difficult for either type of phone.
For an iPhone, you would tap the contact card located at the top of the text message. Once opened, select the “Info” icon and open the “Details” menu. You should see the option “Block this Caller” near the bottom. Select it and the number will be blocked.
For Android users, it’s fairly similar. Go to your messages app and tap on the text from the spam number. Select the three dots from the upper right corner of your screen. You should see “Block Number” as an option.
Select it and then choose “Block” to confirm. It’s important to note that this option will only block one number. You would most likely still receive spam texts in the future, just from a different number that you would have to block.
Use An App
There are quite a lot of apps out there that claim to help with spam, but they often go about it the wrong way. Most of these apps will create a blacklist of numbers that will block the spam number, but they are often ineffective against more persistent spammers.
With Firewall, all calls are blocked except those that you “whitelist” or allow to connect. This way, you’re in control of who rings through and who is blocked.
A whitelist means that the specific number has been personally approved by you. So if your family, friends, or work are texting you then the message is sent through. If the number has not been approved then the message will only make it to your Burner number and not to your personal line.
The Takeaway
It’s hard to understate just how irritating it is to receive a text chime, notification, or vibration from your phone only to open it up and see yet another spam text. There are so many potential ways that a spammer might have gotten your number and most of them are out of your control.
Since it’s virtually impossible to prevent spam, the best option is to accept it and focus on blocking them. While you can individually block numbers and report them, it won’t stop the constant bombardment of spam.
Using an app like Firewall helps to keep your personal line safe and keeps you from deleting spam texts because they won’t make it to you unless you whitelist the number they’re sent from. You can try Firewall for free and leave the spam texts in your past.
SOURCES
Your Data Is Shared and Sold...What's Being Done About It? | Knowledge@Wharton
What Is Contact Center ANI Automatic Number Identification | NICE