Ask HN: Most calls I get on my phone are bots/spam. What are my options?

4 points by ysilver 10 years ago | 3 comments

Over the past few years, I have gradually been receiving more and more spam calls. Some are robo ads trying to sell me something ("I'm your local Google specialist...") and other times there is nobody on the other end (which I've heard is one way spammers check to see if a number is active).

Things have reached the point where I would estimate that the substantial majority of my phone calls are now bots.

What are my options for fixing this?

smt88 10 years ago |

TrueCaller claims to help with this, but their app seems risky to me in terms of permissions/privacy. Google Voice does help with this, but I don't know that you could port your number at this point.

eip 10 years ago |

It's easy. Just never answer your phone unless you recognize the number.

nmcfarl 10 years ago | |

I've gone further than this – my default ringtone is silent. Contacts that are important enough get a ringtone. Everyone else goes direct to voicemail and I don't even know they called, unless they leave a message.