How to Block Spam Calls On iPhone: Essential Tips and Tricks

How to recognize a spam call

In general, fraudsters rely on psychology and the element of surprise when trying to scam someone.  They tend to catch you off-guard, manipulate you and take your money before you even realize it’s a scam. So remembering the main signs of spam calls to counter fraudsters would be a wise thing to do. Here are the red flags to watch out for:    

Prerecorded/robotic message

If you pick up a call and hear a robotic voice saying something without stopping, in 9 cases out of 10 you’re receiving a spam call. However, modern fraudsters go far beyond just calling you with a robotic voice saying a scripted text. Many scammers use voice recognition technology to trick you into a fraud as you may think you’re talking to a real person. 

Threatening and hostile language

Scammers can try to frighten by sounding threatening and hostile. For example, they can pretend to be bank security employees or even IRS workers and say in an aggressively commanding tone that your credit card is blocked and you need to tell them its credentials. 

Another dirty trick is to try to convince you that some of your relatives or friends are in grave danger, so you need to transfer an X sum of money to a specific account to help them. Scammers are extremely inventive, but whatever they come up with, it always sounds manipulative and threatening. Bear that in mind, and you’ll have better chances to detect scam calls. 

Request to confirm your personal information 

Scammers may ask to confirm your address, Social Security number (or information from any other document), credit card credentials, and so on. Again, they may say they’re a bank employee, police officer, government representative, or any other authoritative person to emphasize their legitimacy. Fraudsters will do their best to confuse you and fish out your money, so if you hear that a caller tries to make you feel confused or frightened, do your best to keep calm and hang up the call. 

A claim that your device is infected with malware 

It’s a common scam tactic to take you by surprise claiming that your iPhone is infected with some dangerous malware, which is why you need to share your personal information to avoid getting your device blocked. Spam callers count on the lack of your tech savviness to get your personal information and money. Beyond a doubt, these threats about dangerously infected iPhones are sheer nonsense, so you can be confident it’s a scam call when you hear such a cock-and-bull story. 

Offer of a discounted product or congratulations on winning a prize

On the opposite side of threatening and hostile language, offering you a freebie is another hallmark of scam. Such spam calls congratulate you on winning a prize or offer you a particular product/service at a very special price discounted exclusively for you. Fraudsters expect that you’ll be tempted to grab this gravy train ticket without overthinking about whether such luck is possible and give away everything you have from personal information to the CVV code of your debit card. 

Blocking spam numbers: main recommendations

Fraud calls seem to look like epidemic, but there are credible ways how you can block spam calls on iPhone. Here’s your go-to vaccine: 

Block individual spam calls

1. Navigate to the Phone app and locate the specific number you wish to block. You can typically locate it within the Recents list, although it may also be found in Contacts, Favorites, or Voicemail, depending on your interaction history with the number. Select the “i” icon next to the number.

2. In the iPhone’s recent call history view, the highlighted “i” icon is displayed next to a number.

3. Scroll down and choose the option “Block this Caller”.The details for the phone number are displayed, with “Block this caller” highlighted. Then, just tap “Block Contact.”

Block all unknown calls

To be on the safe side, use the best way to block spam calls on iPhone — block all unknown and private numbers! Just follow these steps:

1. Open Settings and navigate to the Phone section.

2. Scroll down and select “Silence Unknown Callers.”

3. Toggle the switch to the On (green) position.

Now your iPhone will only allow calls from numbers in your Contacts or those you’ve previously interacted with. Additionally, numbers from your text messages app or WhatsApp will still be accepted. This ensures that only legitimate numbers can reach you while blocking completely unknown numbers. All attempted calls, including blocked ones, will still be visible in your Recents list.

Get spam protection from your phone carrier

There is no standard code to block spam calls on iPhone set by phone carriers to protect their customers, so you’d better check whether such an option is available with your carrier. Even though it may go as a separate service, paying this fee is much cheaper than losing a significant amount of money or spending extra costs on sedative pills. 

Apart from that, you can use various third-party apps to block spam calls on your iPhone. We will touch upon these apps a little bit later. 

Submit your number to Do Not Call Registry

You can simply request the Do Not Call Registry to add your mobile number to the database to silence all unknown calls and prevent your number from getting into the list of contacts that are sold for advertising and on the dark web. Just dial 1-888-382-1222 or 1-866-290-4236 for teletypewriter (TTY). 

If you are not from the United States, you may have a similar service in your country. This may sound way too obvious, but simple googling will do the trick in this case! 

Ways to prevent spam calls

Even though you now know how to block calls on your iPhone, to avoid your phone number getting into the hands of fraudsters and advertising agencies, here’s a bunch of extra rules that are simple to follow: 

Don’t click on any suspicious links 

You may get a message via social media or SMS with a link that pretends to lead you to a page with useful information, discounted products/services, or anything else that may look entirely harmless. If you follow such a link, your phone number, as well as other personal information, will likely leak, and you can expect tons of spam calls assaulting your iPhone.  

Don’t share your phone number anywhere

First of all, we warn you against sharing your phone number on social media. Even though you hide your contact information in your profile, a social media platform knows it, which means it will be sold to advertisers. All the controversies revolving around social media companies gathering and selling personal data of their users aren’t just gossip topics for tabloids. In fact, social media apps collect a staggering 86% of users’ private data, which can hardly be called an exaggeration. 

Besides, we recommend you refrain from leaving your contact information in shops, restaurants, and various organizations that may ask it for various purposes such as analytics, reporting, and anything equally important. Whatever the reason, the result is the same: you’ll get spam calls, regardless of the initial aim of taking your phone number. 

Use anti-spam apps

There are a lot of anti-spam applications that gather a database of spam phone numbers, and once such a number disturbs you, the app will auto block a spam call on your iPhone. But we have to remind you that there are many fake anti-spam apps that actually collect your data and sell it to spammers, thereby making your situation even worse. That’s why it’s paramount to use only trusted and reliable services like Truecaller, Robokiller, or Verizon Call Filter. 

Don’t sign up for online services with your phone number

Just like with social media and leaving feedback, never use your phone number for signing up for any online service. True, it’s convenient and saves you time compared to creating an account and confirming your email address. But you’ll never regret the effort you took to preserve your phone number from sharing. Online services also may collect your phone number for selling it to advertisers or using it for promoting their additional and partner products. You may use a particular service for once but will get taken by the storm with spam calls for ages.  

Use a virtual private network (VPN) to conceal your personal information

The use of VPN is a boon to your privacy if you need to protect any of your personal information. A robust virtual private network like VeePN, encrypts all your data with AES-256 standard, making all your personal data unreadable for hungry advertisers and scammers. In addition, VeePN can enhance your online security by encoding your private information twice with a Double VPN, and ensure that it won’t leak in case the connection fails with a Kill Switch feature. 

Safeguard your iPhone and nerve cells with VeePN

Being annoyed and losing money because of spam callers is decidedly uncool, which is why we hope our guide will help you block spam numbers on your iPhone and stay in high spirits. Just remember, it’s better not to share your phone number anywhere be it Facebook, an Italian cuisine restaurant, or a free AI tool turning your text into Master Yoda speech. 

If you still feel unsure whether your iPhone is well-protected against spam calls and you want to make it impossible to track, don’t hesitate to get a VeePN for iOS. It is easy to set up VPN for iOS, and it works perfectly with any mobile browser: Apple Safari, iOS Opera, Google Chrome, or any other you like. Choose VeePN pricing plan right now to forget about disturbing spam calls once and for all!

Written by VeePN Research Lab VeePN Research Lab is dedicated to provide you latest posts about internet security and privacy.

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