The Growing Number Of Spam And Robo-Calls, And The Impending Penalty

These robocalls usually begin with a recorded or a real voice exploiting the vulnerabilities of people, for example by telling them that a close family member is locked up in jail and needs to be bailed out immediately, or that they will be arrested for engaging in tax fraud. The use of fear tactics enables these robo callers to make a large number of people fall into their trap and shell out their personal and sensitive information, which the scammers then misuse.

What Are Spam Calls Or Robocalls?

These are the fake calls that people receive from unknown numbers, claiming severe issues that need immediate attention and action, but in reality, are hoax calls that intend to extract people’s personal, official, or financial data. Such requests are known as spam calls.

When the adversary is not a real person but a recorded voice, executing a similar task of maliciously conning innocent people, then it’s referred to as robocalls.

What Spam Calls Can Do

Spam calls are not just calls that are made randomly to annoy and disturb the person at the other end; these are calls that pose a more significant and grave threat, that of exploiting sensitive data from a person by instilling in him a fear of a fake and adverse condition that could have drastic effects.

This means that the spam calls threaten people to force them to share their details, lest they get behind bars or even worse, they lose their life or that of a loved one. These spam callers:

• Extract Credit Card And Other Financial Details. By offering fake rewards such as winning a lottery or a jackpot, these robo callers ask the victim to share his/her bank details over the phone.
• Disguise The Number And Increase Their Credibility. The reason why the “Do not call list” is no longer helpful in preventing spam calls is that the adversaries are using technological advancements to their benefit and succeed in disguising their phone numbers. While the actual spammer might be sitting in Kenya or Paraguay, a person at Rochester will see a number with the same code as that of his area, making him believe that it’s perhaps some neighbor or friend who is calling. This is also known as ‘Phone Spoofing.’

Types Of Spam Calls

Immigrants-Targeting Spam Calls

These calls target the immigrant population residing in a country, for example, the Chinese community living in the US. Spammers call such people, impersonating officials from the Chinese Embassy, and try to extract personal information from them.

Prominent Spam Calls

These are relatively easy to spot as these spammers impersonate bank personnel or other company employees and say that the targets have pending bills or perhaps a problem in their bank accounts, for which they need to share their account details. One can quickly figure out whether it is indeed a legitimate call by reasoning and figuring out if a similar instance had happened in the recent past. Moreover, bank officials never call their customers to ask for bank details.

Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Scams

Scammers call up people from telephone numbers that resemble the actual IRS assistance centers, impersonate the IRS employees, and use pseudonyms to fool their targets. The victims are pushed into a fake situation of crisis by these scammers, who tell them that they owe money to the government. They are then pestered to pay the pending amount immediately through a gift card or wire transfer.

How To Handle Spam Calls Or Robocalls?

• Once you notice something suspicious about the call, hang up the call immediately. Also, make sure not to press any key which the caller may ask you to, or else, it might lead to an increase in the number of robocalls that you receive.
• Contact your network service provider immediately and ask them to block the number from which you got a spam call, also ensure not to make any extra payment for the same as the investment is not worth incurring in today’s advanced world where spammers can disguise and change their numbers more frequently than we change our dresses.
• Seek help from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). The Federal Trade Commission recommends that people who frequently face intrusive robocalls should install third-party call-blocking apps on their phones. These apps help people in creating blacklists, which is a curated list of numbers that are blocked from calling their cell phones.

Precautions Taken By The US Government

• The Senate bill, also known as the TRACED Act (Telephone Robocall Abuse Criminal Enforcement and Deterrence) Act (S.B. 151), is the latest and perhaps will be the most effective means of stopping the ever-increasing number of spam calls. This bill will impose on the robocallers and spam callers a penalty of $ 10,000 for every spam call.
• The bill, if passed, will also compel phone service providers (telecom companies) to use call authentication technology to stop illegitimate calls or impose substantial restrictions on spam callers from reaching the general public.

Conclusion

Robocalls and spam calls have become so much nuisance that people in many places are wary of picking up their cell or landline phones. The detestable thing about many spam calls is that they feed on the insecurities of their targets, many of who are the elderly and people from the weaker sections of society.

It’s time to put an end to the practice, and now, with the involvement of the government, that time may be coming near. Meanwhile, you should be aware of the things mentioned above to have a chance to safeguard yourself and to be able to take effective countermeasures.