Have a whistle next to your phone. Blow the whistle into the phone when one of those scammers call.
Will blow out an eardrum, causing great pain.
They likely won’t stop but it is worth a try.
Also, do not answer any calls, if it’s important they will leave a message.
If a scammer call they won’t.
Not answering will eventually help stop the calls because your number will be considered inactive.
Because you answer you ensure they know someone is there and they will continue calling and will sell your active number to other phone scammers.
I have a recording of a fax machine answering the call. I put the phone next to the speaker and hit play. Seems to have helped some.
Robots don't have eardrums.
Not answering your phone works - but you have a phone so you can answer it.
Not answering will eventually help stop the calls because your number will be considered inactive. I wish. The rate of calls hasn't dropped in over a year.
I have a land line tied to my cable account. I never use it. It is infrequently answered. For fourteen months it has been in place and it now gets about a dozen calls a day — all junk. It is answered about once every third day just because my wife wants to see what the current scam caller is about.
The call frequency is not decreasing —perhaps increasing.
So, you think the telephone system has a wide dynamic range, huh? It doesn't.
I remember when I was first issued a company cell phone, about eighteen years ago. I had been carrying a personal phone but only ever received calls from less then a dozen people. So I got rid of the personal phone and used the company phone exclusively.
It was such an annoyance to be working on a problem and have the phone ring, only to discover that it was a robocall inviting me to listen to some sob story or buy some crap.
So I adopted the same strategy I had previously employed with my personal phone of only answering the thing if caller ID showed it to be a legitimate caller. The strategy worked well. I routinely advised coworkers and customers of my policy and assured them that I would take their calls - as long as I knew it was them. The coworkers that blocked their number from caller ID would need to leave a message and I would promptly respond.
One day my boss overheard me advising a coworker of this policy and had a cow. She told me that I must answer all calls. I replied, "Just because a phone rings doesn't mean that it must be answered" and explained my policy of ignoring blocked callers but responding to messages and reminded her of how she had never received a complaint because all of my customers shared my antipathy to spam callers. She expressed her reservations but allowed me to continue my cell phone policy. That policy was unofficially adopted by most of my crew.
All your stated points are very true.
I never answer a call from an unknown number.
I have a friend that enjoys blowing an harmonica into the ears of telemarketers. It drives his dog crazy but I think it’s worthwhile.