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Comment by abawany | Hacker News Reader

Google Voice (GV) and Voip.ms have fairly sophisticated screening that tends to get the 'vehicle warranty' bots to hang up quickly. I wish our phone carriers offered such methods to ensure that their 'services' remain relevant in an increasingly spammy world. Edit: for GV, you will need to enable screening by going to https://voice.google.com/u/0/settings and setting "Screen calls" and for Voip.ms, you will need to setup a IVR so that callers have to enter in a code before they are allowed through.

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I get MANY GV spam calls

https://i.imgur.com/jKEA3Tw.png

I NEVER use my GV number... I just don't know how they get my number to begin with....

But the numbers that are super spam are all the ones with ~4 second VM.

I keep hearing from this weird New Jersey Jewish Accent where he tells me "I am under attack for someone who is causing my pain and attempting to steal money from me and if I pray and send him money he will take care of this attack against me"

This spam call is really good at avoiding number blocking - and I get ~2 calls per month from this recording... (The accent is like if Mel Blanc attempted to do an over-the-top Jewish accent... its really over the top. I recommend everyone listen to it and picture "The Producers" with Mel Blanc singing it...

I actually listen to it every few months or so because how comical the message is.

Consider enabling screening in GV settings https://voice.google.com/u/0/settings .

I use GV and call-screening. Much less spam. Callers hate it, but it's kinda like a verbal captcha.

Oh and my cell phone area code is different than the local area code - so I ignore all calls from my (xxx) - xxx range regardless.

My family/friends have my direct#.

BTW, you can go into 'Legacy GV' interface and into Groups to whitelist contact groups (e.g. 'All Contacts') who will get straight to you without this screening.

Thanks - this is excellent.

> I just don't know how they get my number to begin with....

They don't need to get it. They can just take random guesses with valid area/country codes.

I've been using google voice for 7+ years and I get a TON of those vehicle warranty calls. At least one almost every day.

You need to enable screening by going to https://voice.google.com/u/0/settings .

I've got screening enabled and still get at least 3 spam calls per day, usually more.

I am surprised - they are ringing your phone/the app vs. just ending up as 'missed calls'? I presume you are also marking them as spam to prevent recurrence and that these numbers are not in your contacts? (Not being sarcastic, just trying to help.)

Yes, it rings my phone. Most are annoyingly early in the morning, and 90% of the time it comes from random numbers in the same area code as my phone number.

I haven't been marking the numbers as spam, but maybe I'll try to do that to see if the number of calls reduces.

One more thing to check: in the Legacy GV webapp (google.com/voice/b/0/redirection/voice) in the Groups tab, the Screening is On for anonymous callers in addition to the original place that I listed above?

Hopefully marking as spam will help too. One thing I like about Voip.ms vs. GV is that in the former, I can mass block an entire range of number using wildcards, which is rather satisfying especially since I setup the rules to ring as busy vs. just hanging up to keep their systems online a bit longer vs. freeing them to disrupt their next victim.

I'm on Google Fi and get car warranty calls all the time.

The only technique that works is to not answer the phone unless it's from a known contact. Most spam stuff won't leave a message, or it will be a consistent ~4 seconds of silence. Fi (or Android? IDK) has a call screening function which 9/10 if I send something to it, they will hang up before the automated preamble finishes.

Google Fi and Google Voice are not the same thing - Fi has no such built-in protection.

I think they do have the same feature, despite being different services. In fact, I believe that the call screen service is offered even on any Pixel phone, regardless of carrier (Google Fi).

https://support.google.com/voice/answer/9262934

https://support.google.com/phoneapp/answer/9118387

I think we need an automated Invoice Filing System for "warranty calls" billed directly to the auto companies.

In addition to the Hilton and Marriott Hotel Chains for their "You recently stayed at the [Hotel]" calls...

I was an elite member at Marriott for years, and I am convinced that my numbers were released in their breaches.

> Voip.ms

i ported my mobile number to them a week ago hoping to only ever need an LTE, 5G or WiFi data connection for cell service.

alas, i discovered that MMS (and therefore group SMS, too) dont't work through SIP protocol. that's a deal breaker for me, unfortunately. looks like i'll have to port it back out to AT&T, Verizon or T-Mobile :(

You are right - the MMS functionality is only supported by their web app so far: https://wiki.voip.ms/article/MMS . Is Google Voice an option for you or are you (understandably) hesitant to use their services for a critical/sensitive/family number? Based on my limited use, GV appears to support MMS including in group texts.

The latest trick is for spammers to send MMS and then see who responds. I am still getting texts from people on the thread to stop responding, although now it devolved into a political fight with two numbers constantly texting "Trump won". There is no way to remove myself either... I had to disable GV forwarding, but apparently this is enough of a problem that they are disabling forwarding anyway.

I recommend marking the thread as spam then - that tends to disappear it altogether.

The Google Pixel has this built in as well.

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