Why do they call me and hang up?

It seems impossible to avoid spam calls in which someone offers us another credit card, more insurance, or a different cell phone plan. And although regulators in every country have taken steps in the right direction by urging advertising and sales companies not to call users unless they want to, sooner or later they end up secretly calling us for products we don’t want or need. . At least we don’t want to at the moment when they call us.

Even more annoying is the answer because you are waiting for a call from an unknown number and find that the phone is hung up. Why do they call me and hang up? The answer is quite simple, but it reveals the monster that is the spam call industry.

Why do they call and hang up?

This annoying practice is primarily associated with the spam calling industry, in which a computer system, commonly called a bot, calls numbers in a database. The goal is that as soon as the user answers, the call is automatically connected to a human operator who offers a particular service, however, if there is no operator available when the sender picks up, the call ends abruptly. In general, this is the reason why people call and hang up.

Another possibility, much more distant, is that these are long-distance calls for economic gain. In Mexico, for example, the media warned about vangiri scamwhich consisted of making a long-distance call to get an answer, hanging up to create a certain wait, and waiting for the user to answer the call, attempt to communicate, and finally hang up. Calling back and attempting to communicate for at least a few seconds would represent an economic benefit to the caller. However, this type of scam does not seem to be the norm and can be easily detected if the call is from a foreign number.

How to block spam calls?

Almost all call management apps that come pre-installed on Android 12 or later phones have a spam call blocking feature. In fact, in Android 14, the operating system detects spam calls while the phone is ringing. iOS, the iPhone’s operating system, also has a feature to block calls from spam numbers.

However, we believe that one of the most reliable ways to avoid these calls is to use the Google Phone app. If you don’t have it installed, go to the Play Store and search for it. Google phone.

Now open the app and set it as your default call management app. This option usually depends on the brand of your phone, but typically you’ll need to go to Settings, search for your phone, and select options. Set as default. If you have multiple options, choose Google Phone (it may just be called Phone).

Now open the app, click on the three dots located in the top right corner and click on Settings. Now find the “Caller ID and Spam” option and click on it. You’ll see a couple of boxes, so check the one that says Filtering spam calls.

If you set this setting, the Google Phone app will detect when you receive calls from an automated platform, only the type of call they ring and hang up on. Although the call will be blocked, it will appear in the log, which will be useful in case an important call ends up in the filter.

Finally, you can add an extra layer of protection by enabling the feature to block unknown or private numbers.

To do this, go to the “Settings” section again and find the “Blocked numbers” option. Now just check the “Block unknown/private” checkbox. Just keep in mind that this option will literally forward any call coming from a number you don’t have on record. If that seems like too much, we suggest you activate it when you’re on vacation or just looking for some unplug.