4 ms·

I turned on "silence unknown callers" for a month or two and that seemed to get my number off of the hot list.

jzig 4y ago
The trick is to pick up and immediately mute your phone. They will hang up and eventually flag the number as inactive or unscammable (like maybe it’s a machine picking up). If you don’t answer, they can call back later. If you pick up and say something, then they know there is a human behind the number and that it is actively used.
- snarfy 4y ago
  Change your voicemail prompt to "We're sorry, the number cannot be completed as dialed..."
  - ungamedplayer 4y ago
    They don't fall for this. Or at least using the local Australian no-number recording... Somehow they know.
  - tzs 4y ago
    Back in the land line days I bought a nifty gadget that you plugged in between the phone and the line. It had a button that when pressed would inject the intercept special information tone [1] that the phone company used to tell calling equipment that the number was no longer in service. It seemed to work pretty well. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_information_tone https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_information_tone
- xupybd 4y ago
  I pretend to do as they ask but purposely stuff up the instructions until they get frustrated. It's amusing how many creative insults they have. Most are directed at my mother for some reason.
dboreham 4y ago
I haven't answered the phone for non-family callers in 20 years. They still call several times a day (or their Perl scripts do).
drusepth 4y ago
I haven't answered my phone except for family members for coming on 3-4 years now and still get 3-4 spam voicemails a day. That number goes way up when I start screening the calls though, so maybe there is something to answering vs not.
13of40 4y ago
A little town I know has maintained their antique telephone exchange for going on 40 years, and one of the features is that they have a block of numbers that lead to all the error messages. (541-447-0054 for example) For a while I redirected my phone number to one of their error messages, and now I rarely get robocalls, because the spammers presumably blacklisted me.
deleted 4y ago
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jzig 4y ago

The trick is to pick up and immediately mute your phone. They will hang up and eventually flag the number as inactive or unscammable (like maybe it’s a machine picking up). If you don’t answer, they can call back later. If you pick up and say something, then they know there is a human behind the number and that it is actively used.

snarfy 4y ago
Change your voicemail prompt to "We're sorry, the number cannot be completed as dialed..."
- ungamedplayer 4y ago
  They don't fall for this. Or at least using the local Australian no-number recording... Somehow they know.
- tzs 4y ago
  Back in the land line days I bought a nifty gadget that you plugged in between the phone and the line. It had a button that when pressed would inject the intercept special information tone [1] that the phone company used to tell calling equipment that the number was no longer in service. It seemed to work pretty well. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_information_tone https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_information_tone
xupybd 4y ago
I pretend to do as they ask but purposely stuff up the instructions until they get frustrated. It's amusing how many creative insults they have. Most are directed at my mother for some reason.

dboreham 4y ago

I haven't answered the phone for non-family callers in 20 years. They still call several times a day (or their Perl scripts do).

drusepth 4y ago

I haven't answered my phone except for family members for coming on 3-4 years now and still get 3-4 spam voicemails a day. That number goes way up when I start screening the calls though, so maybe there is something to answering vs not.

13of40 4y ago

A little town I know has maintained their antique telephone exchange for going on 40 years, and one of the features is that they have a block of numbers that lead to all the error messages. (541-447-0054 for example) For a while I redirected my phone number to one of their error messages, and now I rarely get robocalls, because the spammers presumably blacklisted me.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]