DNA Special: How the problem of ‘spam’ calls is affecting people

Today, most people are struggling with the problem of spam calls. But an even bigger problem is that there is no schedule of such spam calls. It can also come to you at 7 in the morning and at 9 in the night. Anyone can call you to buy something.

And that's why a large number of people are now afraid to pick up calls with unknown numbers. But this fear of spam calls for the last few years has become a reality of every Indian’s mobile phone. Today, almost every Indian mobile user is frustrated by this problem of spam calls. 

Data suggests that every Indian gets such unwanted calls on an average two to three times a day. According to this survey of Local Circles:

- 96 percent of mobile customers complained that they get at least one spam call a day
- 30 percent of the people involved in the survey have agreed to receive such unwanted calls once or twice a day
- 66 percent of the people have admitted that on average they receive three or more spam calls per day.
- 45 percent of mobile users complained about receiving three to five spam calls every day
- Surprisingly, 5 percent of mobile users are also those who get more than 10 spam calls throughout the day.

People also believe that often when they are busy, they get such spam calls, which makes them upset and such calls are also making them irritated. Many times, people also miss their important phone calls in an attempt to avoid unwanted calls, because these telemarketing companies usually use such phone numbers, which can be misunderstood by anyone. 

- 93.5 percent of spam calls come for sales. 
- 60 percent of people received calls for financial services, such as credit cards, insurance policy or bank loan
- 18 percent people got unwanted calls to buy real estate
- 10 percent of people get freelance jobs or employment-related calls
- 2 percent of people related to healthcare-pathology services
- 2 percent people get calls related to better mobile service and data plan

These are the figures of the year 2017 and these figures show that 380 crore spam calls were recorded only in the month of October. Imagine how far this figure will have reached today. The matter is not just unwanted calls on your phone. The case is much more serious than this. Because during this time, 1.4 percent of the total spam calls were used for fraud. More than 3 crore calls were made to rob hard-earned money of people. 

It is also not that efforts were not made to stop these unwanted calls. Telecom Regulatory Authority of India i.e. TRAI had implemented rules to stop such SPAM calls in the year 2018. DND i.e. Do Not Disturb was given, which could help in avoiding such unwanted calls by making it active through telecom operators. Actually, the government has banned many numbers under DND.