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Comment by snowwrestler | Hacker News Reader

My solution to robocalls is to answer them and then be totally silent. After a few seconds, they disconnect.

The number of robocalls I receive has plummeted since I started doing this. I receive hardly any these days. My theory is that due to silent answers, the autodialers eventually mark the number as bad, or as a machine-answered number. I have no proof of this, though.

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However, your number is still being sold and resold, so every time a new scammer opens shop you start to get calls again.

I answer and have fun pretending that I’m a lunatic. I generally get hung up on within a minute, and at least that minute is a bit of fun.

I do this sometimes too. It seems like an ethical way to have somewhat the same sort of fun as old-fashioned crank calls.

I've always done something similar, it's been supported on every cell phone I've owned (flip-phones and Android phones): Instead of answering or declining, tap the volume key. That mutes the ringer but lets it keep ringing on the remote end. So from their perspective no one picks up, and it doesn't annoy you.

I can't tell if it would have the same effect as your method though, since I've done it for so long, but I only get like 1 scam call on my cell every 3-4 months (and it's usually one forwarded from my work phone). My desk phone at work, which I have to answer and haven't tried this with, gets one call every couple of weeks.

My solution is to play along with the pitch, taking as long as possible with my answers, until they ask for my credit card number. Then I make up 15 digits, making sure to mess up a couple times along the way.

Then I ask whether they have a do not call list.

I'll have to try that out. I've been noticing that most of the calls I was getting were from the same spammy place. I found out if I listen till the end they often have an option to be removed from their list. "Press 2 to be removed", if only it was always 2 that would be too easy. I hate listening to the entire ad but I have been getting a lot less since I've been hanging in there and asking to be removed.

It is a coincidence. Legitimate operations are not spoofing their numbers in the first place, whereas spoofers have shown themselves to be dishonest by spoofing.

So you are not being removed from any spam lists using this method. Not only do they have zero incentive to remove you, they have also received a reliable indication that a human answers your phone.

My solution is to let Google spam filter them. It does a good job and I report every call that manages to get through. Haven't picked one up in months now.

True, I do the same too. I take the call, mute my phone and keep it as long as the other person wants it. Spam has reduced, one call in the last 3 weeks. It could also be that the spammers are holidaying.

They are definitely holidaying. As soon as the new year starts up expect them to be firing on all cylinders.

I just say 'Yes' after each question. Robo-caller puts me through to human where I continue to say Yes. Eventually they cotton on and hang up.

Hopefully they will blacklist me and no longer annoy me.

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