How to Recognize and Report Spam Text Messages

How to Recognize and Report Spam Text Messages

People use their cellphones dozens of times on daily basis texting their peers, friends and family. Apart from people you know, you’re bound to often receive text messages from an unknown sender, the world is full of scammers who try to steal personal information. Spam messages have become a recurring annoyance for recipients. What’s worse is that a lot of people have and continue to fall in the trap of well-planned SMS Marketing campaigns.

Most of the time, it can be hard to tell the difference between messages from a legitimate company or an attempted scam. Scammers are evolving and looks like a legitimate organization trying to contact you via text messaging with different masking technologies and other ways to try and take your hard-earned money.

Spam Statistics

Even though SMS marketing amounts for the least amount of spamming, here are some interesting stats;

1. According to a survey, 68% of recipients say they’ve experienced spam messages.
2. 70% of recipients click on links sent via text messages.
3. 25% of recipients said they receive 3-4 spam messages on average every day.

How to Know If It’s a Spam?

Scammers usually send fake text messages to try and phish out passwords, social security numbers and account numbers. With anyone of these, they could get access to your email, bank and other accounts. Today, scammers have different ways to lure you in such as;

1. Great deals on products that don’t work or even exist
2. Free prizes, coupons or gift cards
3. Earning programs
4. Interest free credit cards or loans
5. Fake job interviews
6. Property fraud

In many cases, scammers start off by saying they’ve noticed suspicious activity in your account, ask for verification of your payment information, send fake invoices with call to action or even fake delivery receipts on products or services you did not purchase. A simple text message can be used to learn how much money you make so they could sell their goods. However, in the last few years, they have kicked things up a notch by sending links to fake website and malware.

How to Deal with Spam Text Messages

The easiest thing to do when you get a text message you weren’t expecting is to ignore and delete it. Always remember that legitimate companies never ask for personal information over text. If you have doubts and think the message is real, you should contact the company on a number or website you know is real.

There are some other ways to filter unwanted text messages or stop them before they reach you;

1. Many phones have an option to block or filter messages from unknown senders.
2. Wireless providers also have tools or service that let users block calls and texts.
3. Users can opt-out from receiving marketing messages by responding STOP/CANCEL/Unsubscribe and other related keywords.
4. There are many call-blocking apps that also block text messages. You can check on ctia.org for apps available for Android, Apple, and Windows.
5. Report the message to the Federal Trade Commission.

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