Robocall Resurgence: Spam calls increase by 10% in February 2021

Scammers are back with a vengeance after a slow 2020 with spam calls reaching 5.6 billion

NEW YORK, March 9, 2021 /PRNewswire/ — RoboKiller, the app that eliminates 99% of spam calls and text messages, reveals 5.6 billion spam calls were received by Americans during February 2021, a 10% increase in robocalls from January 2021 and a 26% increase compared to February 2020.

Phone scammers are back with a vengeance after 2020 crippled their ability to place billions of spam calls - severely impacting their overall financial earnings. According to RoboKiller, 2020 saw a 6.7 billion drop in spam calls from 2019 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but since September 2020, spam calls have returned to normal levels of 5 billion spam calls or more a month. A whopping 5.8 billion spam texts in February 2021 also indicate phone scammers are adopting new methods of reaching Americans’ phones - and aren’t slowing down there either.

KEY FINDINGS IN FEBRUARY 2021

Top Phone Scams:

In February, the top robocall scam was vehicle warranty-related at 23% of total spam calls - a 9% increase from January 2021, followed by health insurance-related calls at 9% and vacation-related scams at 6.5%.

Top Five Most Spam-Called States:

Robocalls New Partner In Crime: Spam Text Messages

Since January of last year, Americans have been receiving on average 5 billion spam texts per month. In recent months, there has been a steady 15% increase in spam text volumes, reaching all-time highs of 5.8 billion a month as of February 2021. That is roughly 21 spam texts per person!

Top Five Most Spam-Texted States:

What’s in store for 2021?

Story continues

While it’s still early in the year, RoboKiller predicts that spam calls could reach 70 billion by the end of 2021 and result in higher consumer losses to fraud. As noted in the 2020 Insights Report, RoboKiller predicts spam texts will become more prevalent and have the potential to reach 90 billion by the end of the year.

Tips on how to stop phone scams:

• Don’t answer phone calls from unknown phone numbers, especially those that call at odd hours.

• Never provide personal, banking, or sensitive information over the phone to any caller.

• Don’t follow any prompts like “Press 1” or click any links.

• Watch out for text messages that contain misspelled words, URLs that contain a mix of numbers and letters.

• Download a spam call and text blocker like RoboKiller to equip your phone with the latest phone-scam-fighting technology. Apps like RoboKiller use global databases of millions of known phone scams to prevent these callers from reaching you in the first place.

RoboKiller…