If you say that you have never come across calls that offer “very necessary services”, without which you generally do not understand how you lived before, I will say that you do not have a phone. Indeed, recently this method of advertising has become very popular and almost every resident receives at least several calls a day. This is unpleasant not only because it distracts from important matters, but also because someone constantly invades your personal space. Even if you don't pick up the phone, it’s still unpleasant that someone dared to dial your personal number. If you agree with this (and how could it be otherwise), you probably wondered how to protect yourself from such calls. Today I'm going to talk about a couple of easy ways to do this.
Obsessive calls with suggestions are very annoying.
First of all, it is worthwhile to understand that lately everyone needs our phone numbers. I already talked about how scammers can get all our money if they stole your phone, which has a SIM card without a PIN code. But this is an illegal way to make money on you, and there is a completely legal one.
Where did the spammers get my number
When registering on the website, in the online store, at the checkpoint in the business center, or anywhere, even on the classifieds website, we constantly leave our phone number. It costs nothing to collect all these numbers in a database with names. You can even find out the interests of the owner of the number, if, for example, he ordered a game console in an online store.
All this information can be used against you, but, as a rule, no one acts so subtly and spammers limit themselves to mass calls. If, nevertheless, someone wants to get confused, he can collect a database of site visits from a smartphone. The problem is that such data still needs to be processed to obtain a behavioral model, and in the end it will be very expensive. Most likely, this will not override the benefits of a possible sale of something.
Phone spam
In general, such a phenomenon as telephone spam did not arise from scratch. This is elementary psychology. When a person calls you, you are initially more loyal to him than to the text. E-mails themselves are filtered so that we do not see unnecessary things, and we just delete the SMS right away.
When the phone rings and we answer the call, the person at the other end has the opportunity to hook us with their information. This was especially true a couple of years ago, when calls did not reach such proportions. Now this also works, but mainly with more gullible people, as a rule, the elderly. Usually they fall for free medical examinations and super goods.
An incomprehensible thing that can be sold over the phone. But more often than not, the matter is limited to offering a loan.
Even if you do not pick up the phone when someone calls you from unknown numbers, this does not mean that you will not run into a spammer. There are always moments when you are waiting for a call, for example, from a courier or a buyer of a product displayed on Avito. This is one of the success factors for such spammers.
How to protect yourself from phone spammers
There are several good ways to protect against unwanted calls. Many people know about them, but as I recently became convinced, far from all.
The first way will be the standard functions of a smartphone to block calls from those who are not in your phone book. The method is not bad, but this way you can skip those important calls. For example, if you provide some services or are engaged in other business activities, this option will not work for you, since you will be called very often from unfamiliar numbers.
The second and most correct way would be to install special anti-spam applications. There are such applications for both iOS and Android and are installed from branded app stores.
The most famous of these applications are Yandex, 2Gis and Kaspersky. After installation, you will only have to give the appropriate rights in the settings and information about him will be displayed next to the caller's number on the screen. To do this, the number will be compared with the database, where it has already been marked as spam, advertising call or even “possibly intruders”.
If the number is not in the database, that is, it did not appear in the mass calls, it will not be marked in any way. In addition, there are “useful call” marks. With such a mark, I received calls, for example, from a car service with a message that my car is ready and can be picked up, or from a hairdresser with a reminder to record.
Calls are sometimes helpful, but rarely.
In addition, if the number is included in a special directory in which company numbers are collected, you will simply see the name of this company on your screen. This way you will know who is calling you from partners or clients.
To activate the function on iOS after installing the application, go to the phone settings, select the “phone” item, and then go to “Report spam (SMS / calls)”. Next, select the application that you want to activate.
On Android, activation is slightly different and is done, as a rule, through the application itself. For example, to work with Yandex, you need to download its application, go to the rightmost item of the bottom menu and select the “Caller ID” section. After that, give all permissions and enjoy a world in which there is a little more important information.
Personally, I have been using this system for a long time. We can say that such applications collect your numbers for sale on the side, but that is why I prefer to use proven applications released by large companies. There are also less eminent options, but the main thing is that they do not work like with Getcontact, which at one time collected a user database under the pretext of analyzing their phone book.
If you have already used such applications, write about it in the comments or recommend other proven options for protecting against telephone spam. It will be interesting for all of us, because these calls, frankly, got it. A more correct word is simply not proper to speak in a public space.