- U.S. consumers received nearly 4 billion robocalls
per month in 2020, and in spite of the FCC's
effort to combat robocalls and spoofing,
if you have a phone number,
you probably are getting spam calls.
I know that I do.
- Me too.
- Yep, so what can we do about it, David?
- Well, let's start in the iPhone settings app.
There are a few different options available to you.
Tap on Settings, scroll down and tap on Phone.
First thing we're gonna talk about is
Silence Unknown Callers, let's tap on that,
and you can turn on this switch at the top of the screen.
"Calls from unknown numbers will be silenced,
sent to voicemail, and displayed on the Recents list.
Incoming calls will continue to ring
from people in your contacts,
recent outgoing calls, and Siri Suggestions."
- The Silence Unknown Callers will be a good fit
for some people, but it might be overkill for others.
For instance, if you're in sales,
and you want to get phone calls from potential clients,
you don't know their phone number.
If you're expecting a important call from your doctor,
it might be an unknown caller.
So you don't want these things to be silenced.
Fortunately, there are other solutions that are more
middle of the road that we're gonna talk about.
- Yeah, also, I would say that if it's, you know,
your doctor's office, your dentist's office,
you might just wanna add those people to your contacts
and then they won't be silenced as an unknown caller.
- Indeed. - Also, people sometimes ask,
you know, can't I just block these numbers
when they come in?
You could block the spam numbers,
but what they do is they spoof numbers.
It's not their real phone number.
They have machines that every single time,
it's a different phone number.
So if you block one, it's like the Hydra,
you chop off one head and three more pop out.
- Or Whac-A-Mole. - Or Whac-A-Mole, sure.
- It's essentially the modern Hydra, apparently.
I know that, for me, and I don't know if you've had this,
I get spam calls from numbers
that look almost exactly like my own number.
Like, it'll be a couple digits off
because you cannot trust caller ID.
It can be spoofed, it's all electronic.
You would think it's secure
but it's just not, don't trust caller ID.
- If Silence Unknown Callers is a bit too extreme for you,
let's tap back to phone, tap on
Call Blocking and Identification
and look for the switch Silence Junk Callers.
This will vary from carrier to carrier.
So, I have Verizon as my carrier, it sets us up,
I think T-Mobile and AT&T also have similar features.
You can turn that switch on and it says,
"Calls identified by Verizon as potential spam or fraud
will be silenced, automatically sent to voicemail,
and displayed on the Recents list."
- This is a carrier specific option.
If you don't see this here, it's just because your carrier
probably doesn't have this enabled for iPhone.
Fortunately, there are other solutions and I know that,
I have Verizon too, this does not work to block
all the spam calls.
- Right. - I still get spam calls, so.
- You can also see here Call Identification Apps.
We'll get to that in just a little bit,
but first, the Do Not Call Registry.
- This is great for blocking some of the spam calls
that you're gonna get, but it really only works
for legitimate businesses.
So you will get fewer calls, but the real scammers,
the people that are trying to steal from you?
They don't really care about the law.
- (laughing) Yeah. - So they're not gonna care
about this or anything else, but this is still good.
I'm on this list.
- Yeah, one company in Texas got fined $225 million
for violating the FCC's rules,
so if you report 'em and the FCC catches on,
they can crack down pretty hard.
So, Do Not Call Registry.
I'm gonna go to Safari on my iPhone.
The website is, donotcall.gov.
- Yep. - And then-
- Link in the description card.
- Yep. - Can we card this link?
- We could. - We're gonna card this link.
- Yeah, we'll card it- - For you.
Yep. - Yes.
- YouTube might shut us down, but we'd do that for you.
- Yeah, so give this video
a thumbs up in return. - A thumbs up, yeah.
- So, just tap on Register Your Phone, tap Register Here,
and then just enter your phone number.
And then you have to go into your email, open a link,
and then confirm your registration.
But pretty easy to do, and that will really help cut
down some of the spam calls you receive.
- But it will not eliminate all of them.
- Right.
- Fortunately, there's more we can do.
- We touched on this a little bit earlier
with Silence Junk Callers,
but the carriers also offer apps.
You know, AT&T, T-Mobile, Verizon have these apps
that help cut down on spam calls.
They have free versions, which are,
have the features that you need.
There's also paid versions, which you probably don't need.
One app has reverse number look up,
and if it's a call center spoofing phone numbers,
that's just totally useless.
But, look into those apps.
- Or don't.
- (laughing) Because we're about to talk
about some other apps that are not carrier specific.
I personally think that carriers are really good
at nickel and diming people.
I mean, you might be buying carrier insurance and this,
and they've got all these upsells,
so all of a sudden your $30 plan costs $90 a month.
- Yeah.
- I think that there are other ways to manage this
that are probably cheaper and better.
- Yeah, there are a lot of third-party apps
in the app store that help cut down on spam calls.
So if I go to the app store on my iPhone,
and you just go to the search tab,
lower right hand corner of the screen,
and just tap in, you know, robocalls.
You got RoboKiller, Verizon Call Filter,
that's Verizon's obviously.
Truecaller is the one that I installed on my iPhone,
so let's just open that up, for example.
We're not endorsing this app, necessarily,
it's just one of the first ones that popped up
and it was easy to set up.
So, they also have a premium program.
- Of course they do, everybody does.
- Everybody has a premium program.
I'll just tap No Thanks there.
So, once you set up the app on your phone,
enter your phone number,
your personal information, the app is there.
Scam Protection Disabled, let's just tap on Enable.
It'll take you right to the specific section
of the settings app where you need to turn on
these switches and you just tap these switches
to turn 'em on, there you go.
- This gives apps permission to actually block
phone calls that are coming to your phone.
So, you have to be careful about which app you install.
The ones that have a lot of ratings and a lot of stars
are generally very safe, but just know that you're giving
apps access to block phone numbers,
but not access to hear your phone calls.
- Right. - So, Apple has sort of
found a way to toe the line here.
Not toe the line, walk the tight rope.
- Yeah. - With protecting your privacy
but also giving these apps access to
protect your privacy from scammers.
- Yeah, don't install a robocalling app with, you know,
two and a half stars and seven reviews.
RoboKiller,
Truecaller. - (laughing) Yeah, RoboKiller.
- These guys, they have really solid reviews
and five stars and they'll be good.
- Yep, Joe's Spam Call Blocker.
- Yeah. - Yep, Joe's got a list.
- Here's what Apple says about these apps.
"When you receive a call, your device checks
the caller's number and compares it to the list
of phone numbers in your third-party spam apps.
If there's a match, iOS displays the identifying label
chosen by the app, for example, Spam or Telemarketing.
If the app determines that a phone number is spam,
it may choose to block the phone call automatically.
Incoming calls are never sent to third-party developers."
- That was very well read.
Now, today is David's birthday.
- Almost. - He's 28 years old.
- Tomorrow.
- How cool is that?
You know, what's also cool?
Subscribing to this YouTube channel.
(air whooshing) - Yeah.
- What do we have here?
- Whoa! - We've got, that was cool.
A birthday pie.
(lighter clicking) - Yeah, looks delicious.
- (laughing) With a torch lighter.
♪ Happy birthday to you ♪
♪ Happy birthday dear David ♪
♪ Happy birthday to you ♪
- The retention graph just-
- Are you one, are you two,
anyway, subscribe to our channel.
Subscribe asks.
- There is some more you can do.
You can try contacting your wireless carrier.
- You gotta blow out your candle.
- Oh, sorry. (blowing air)
- Okay, please continue.
- Yeah, you can try contacting your wireless carrier.
There may be more they can do for you,
but a lot of it is already built into your phone.
Also, maybe you try, you know, lobbying
(triumphant music) your local congressional
representative, they get
(David P. laughing) these robocalls too.
They're not happy about it,
and the government is trying to crack down on these calls.
- Yeah, they're doing an okay job.
They're not doing a perfect job for sure.
I thought it was funny, the chairwoman of the FCC said this,
"I'm a consumer, too, I receive robocalls at home,
in my office, on my landline, on my mobile.
I've even received multiple robocalls
sitting here on this dais, I want it to stop."
Well, you're in charge.
If there's anybody that can make this stop-
- Yeah. - It's you,
Chairwoman Rosenworcel, so the ball's in your court.
(upbeat music) - Ball's in your court,
FCC, federal government.
That's how to block robocalls on your iPhone.
If you haven't already, try joining this channel.
- (laughing) Yeah, joining this channel
is a great way to support us.
Support David, it's his birthday.
It's very low dollar amount, but very high value.
You get to connect with us in Discord,
but really it just helps us out.
- Yeah. - A lot.
- Member shout outs.
- Yeah, I mean- - Lot of good stuff.
- It's just, you know-
- Custom badges- - Money, we want your money.
It helps. - Thanks for-
- [Both] Thanks for watching.
(electronic beeping) Yeah, this, ugh.