SAN ANTONIO – A federal judge in June ordered Dish Network to pay $280 million fine for making millions of illegal robocalls to numbers on the national do-not-call registry. The problem has gotten worse and consumers are being bombarded by robocalls straight to their cellphones.
Carol Berkow receives a lot of robocalls to her mobile phone.
“I get about five or six robocalls per week. The area codes are from all over the country. I have a baby, and I'm always concerned it could be something about the baby,” she said.
A recent Consumer Reports survey showed that at least 62 percent of AT&T, Centurylink and Verizon customers reported receiving six or more robocalls per week. Now, customers are getting even more aggravating messages.
“We're hearing about ringless voicemail, where calls are directly deposited into consumers voicemail boxes without the phone ever ringing. They can fill up your voicemail inbox and block important messages, which is why we believe it's important that consumers have protections from them,
said Margot Gilman, Consumer Reports’ money editor.
For calls that aren’t bypassing the ring, phone carriers are offering different tools to help.
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AT&T has a free app for its customers that automatically blocks scam calls for iPhone 6 or higher and Android phones that can use AT&T voice.
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T-Mobile offers free scam call-blocking.
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Sprint and Verizon have apps that display the caller’s name on your incoming screen for callers who are not already in your contacts list. And Verizon has also made it easier to sign up with the popular robocall blocker called Nomorobo.
Consumer Reports recommends that customers closely evaluate what kind of information they’re willing to disclose to prevent robocalls, so they need to make sure to look at terms and conditions before signing up for certain products.
Another way consumers can fight back is to report robocalls to the Federal Trade Commission. All they need to do is write down the number and enter it at complaints.donotcall.gov.
To learn more about the steps you can take to protect yourself from robocalls, visit endrobocalls.org.
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