Let’s talk about spam texts and emails

Nice article. Good information and makes people aware of the growing problem. Keep up the great work FTC!

I don't even answer a phone call that I don't recognize. It's usually a telemarketer and I'm intelligent enough to find what I want or need.

A large number of spam emails 900 in 5 minutes is a warning sign. Hidden somewhere in there can be a legitimate notice that a bank account was opened in your name. It happened to me. I wish I had known.

I advise against unsubscribing from spam emails. All that does is confirm that it is a good, active address. Just create a filter if it reaches your inbox, and ignore it.

Thank you so much! I needed this information today and yesterday. Knowledge is powerful. We as consumers can better understand and protect our personal information.

Thank you for this valued information, we are constantly bombarded with these hits on our phone and email. Keep in touch.

Great Article. I learned something new, as I get bombed with continuous political texts, even though I "report as spam and delete" on my iPhone. Thanks for providing a text number to report those unwanted text messages. I'm sure there are many people who don't know this information.

an increasingly dangerous online environment each year---
an unfortunate consequence of garbage email is that an "unsubscrible" linkmay also unleash malware scripts. I use script blockers even on sites I trust, and block 3rd party links/cookies wherever possible (until the trusted site session functionality breaks)

Unsubscribing may not be a good option all the time. Fine with legit sites but unsubscribe can confirm a “real” recipient to a scammer who can share your address and increase targeting for phishing.

Got to ensure you don't mislead unsuspecting readers and make them think the phishing scams have actual methods of Unsubscribing within them......
"Unsubscribe from unwanted emails. Getting fewer unwanted emails helps you avoid clicking on links that can lead to a phishing attack."

All of the true scam spam phishing mail usually has a couple"Unsubscribe" links overlapping the various multiple bogus addresses they copy paste at the end.

I use 7726 all the time. BUT a lot of my spam texts arrive as MMS - requiring me to DOWNLOAD it to read. I will NOT d/L any MMS from unknown numbers. But am unable to forward any MMS texts to 7726, only texts that arrive written out. I immediately block any unknown # or person, however they arrive.
Cell is Samsung S23 Ultra, up to date on everything.
What do I do about this MMS issue?
Thank you

( BTW
I probably have the largest collection of blocked scam, spam or illegal debt collectors in the US.)

Very, very valuable information!

Using phone’s report junk when getting spam texts does not work. I am beyond frustrated and angry with the amount of political texts I receive, a lot of them asking for money. They still come, from different numbers. It is unfairly time consuming on my part to daily, multiple times per day to delete these unwanted texts which use up valuable space on my phone. Something absolutely has to be done about this.

I get an abundance of these All the time. I was was hacked and scammed 5 times last year. They got into everything. And basically got away with it. I just delete everything now or send it to spam. Thank you for caring. And for your help.

While I greatly appreciate the FTC's advice, I would highly recommend that this advice come to us another way, rather than to have us click on the FTC email and their link to read the advice, & does anyone else see the irony in the FTC's advice besides me? (i.e. the FTC is saying not to click on emails from people we don't know, & the links in the emails, in order to avoid malware, spam, etc., yet, they want us to click on random emails we receive from the FTC - we think - & their link - we think its their link anyway - to read their advice about malware & spam & getting our pc's hacked into.....?

It makes zero sense to me, as to why the FTC would encourage this .....?
What's wrong with this picture, right?

I filed with your agency (FTC) along with the Police,My Bank, Credit Card Company (Master Card) My Cell Phone Carrier and Gift Card Companies)

Recently someone one has been sending me emails from People Magazine. Although I never subscribed, I am not able to unsubscribe. When I try to, I get a message “that my unsubscribe failed. But the only thing I can do is delete them. But they continue to come. I know that the messages have fake addresses. Awhile ago I tried to send all these fake emails to a spam address and even to a government agency—well, they came right back to me

WE HAVE TRIED FOR YEARS TO TELL YAHOO MAIL ABOUT THE SPAM / FRAUD BANK EMAILS ETC,,,. BUT NEVER GET THROUGH

In your article there is plenty of ways for the service SUBSCRIBER to avoid scams. Why aren't the service PROVIDERS doing anything? With today's level of technology, it ought to be pretty easy to notice a number or email address sending THOUSANDS of messages per day/hour. But, as usual, our protection is on US. Why?

I am 82 yrs. old and my phone has been ringing every 15 min. and my phone shows up Scam. For me running to the home phone every time it rings is terrible! I have the list of phone numbers they have been calling and some are the same! What can I do to stop this? I am too old for this kind of stuff. Can you help me please?

How does a supposed anti-virus get hacked this easily, and put us consumers at risk? I'm elderly, my computer a new Dell (purchased on Amazon), and I was told to pay over $500.00 for your service. I cannot afford this anymore, and do not know how you have access to my credit card. Please respond?

I am constantly receiving call from people from Yelp subcontractors? I think, they now know I am annoyed by this and these morons think its game. I find it very unprofessional, as I continue to say I am not interested In their services. What can be done?