{"id":379512,"date":"2025-11-15T00:25:14","date_gmt":"2025-11-15T00:25:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/379512\/"},"modified":"2025-11-15T00:25:14","modified_gmt":"2025-11-15T00:25:14","slug":"pennsylvania-woman-gets-hundreds-of-spam-calls-a-day-nbc10-philadelphia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/379512\/","title":{"rendered":"Pennsylvania woman gets hundreds of spam calls a day \u2013 NBC10 Philadelphia"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Many of us get spam calls.  But, we met a Montgomery County woman whose situation reached a whole new level.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m getting another call now from Lord knows where,&#8221; Beth Sanborn said.<\/p>\n<p>NBC10 Responds sat down with Sanborn after learning about her situation.  She is getting hundreds of spam calls a day.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m at the point where they are coming through every three minutes,&#8221; she said.  <\/p>\n<p>She doesn&#8217;t know for sure why they started, but traces them back to one event. &#8220;I can&#8217;t even begin to explain how my life has changed since the beginning of October,&#8221; she said.  <\/p>\n<p>Sanborn tells us that&#8217;s when she saw an ad on social media for an item she was interested in.  She says she wasn&#8217;t familiar with the vendor, but still bought what they were selling.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I really didn&#8217;t think anything of it. I completed the transaction.&#8221; That transaction included sharing her phone number.<\/p>\n<p>She suspects that transaction could have exposed her contact information. &#8220;It seemed as if almost instantly my phone started to blow up with all these international calls.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><strong>NBC10 RESPONDS:  <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcphiladelphia.com\/investigators\/consumer\/philadelphia-grandparent-scam-ai-theft-impersonation-elder-fraud\/4254278\/\" data-type=\"link\" data-id=\"https:\/\/www.nbcphiladelphia.com\/investigators\/consumer\/philadelphia-grandparent-scam-ai-theft-impersonation-elder-fraud\/4254278\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Family says scammers used AI to impersonate granddaughter<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Sanborn&#8217;s order did come in about three weeks, and the spam calls continued. &#8220;Now, I&#8217;m close to 150 to 200 phone calls a day.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Teresa Murray is with Public Interest Research Group (PIRG).  &#8220;I would say that&#8217;s on the outer edge of what a normal person would get.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The Public Interest Research Group (PIRG) says the monthly average of spam robocalls is up 20% compared to last year.  That&#8217;s a 6-year high.<\/p>\n<p>Murray tells us it is possible Sanborn&#8217;s situation could have stemmed from that purchase she made on social media.<\/p>\n<p>There are a variety of pop-ups online that could collect and expose someone&#8217;s phone number. Some examples Murray gave include contests, free products, exclusive or discounted offers.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;&#8216;Oh, enter your phone number for 15% off today only,&#8217; And you&#8217;re like, &#8216;well, yeah, I&#8217;d like 15% off.&#8217; So you enter your phone number, you&#8217;ll get a text and you&#8217;ll have to confirm it,&#8221; she said.<\/p>\n<p><strong>MORE: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcphiladelphia.com\/news\/local\/philly-police-warn-abduction-scam\/4300932\/\" data-type=\"link\" data-id=\"https:\/\/www.nbcphiladelphia.com\/news\/local\/philly-police-warn-abduction-scam\/4300932\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Philly police warn of scam phone calls saying a loved one has been abducted<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Murray stresses not to share your number. &#8220;They have got your phone number, and that is a bad thing.&#8221; If someone answers a spam call and falls for a scam, it just gets worse.<\/p>\n<p>PIRG found the average person who is scammed from a spam call loses nearly $3,700.  Researchers found fewer than half of phone companies have installed the FCC-required caller I.D. or filters to block the calls.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Much of the larger companies that are household names, most of those are either completely in compliance with what they&#8217;re required to do or they&#8217;re partially in compliance,&#8221; Murray said.<\/p>\n<p>Sanborn says she went to her phone provider to check if all available spam blocking settings were enabled.  They were, but it wasn&#8217;t working.<\/p>\n<p>The U.S. Telecom Industry tells NBC10 that it disagrees with PIRG&#8217;s findings.  It says robocalls have actually been declining.<\/p>\n<p>Sanborn says that&#8217;s far from her case. &#8220;I&#8217;m fighting a losing battle.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>For a consumer who gets the typical amount of spam calls, there are steps to block them.<\/p>\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Make sure your phone software is up to date.<\/li>\n<li>Many of the updates include new spam protections.<\/li>\n<li>This might sound like a given, but don&#8217;t answer calls or texts from unfamiliar numbers.<\/li>\n<li>The less interaction spammers get, they are less likely to reach out again.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Many of us get spam calls. But, we met a Montgomery County woman whose situation reached a whole&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":379513,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5132],"tags":[5229,9631,182024,1448,2830,1311,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-379512","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-philadelphia","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-montgomery-county","10":"tag-nbc10-responds","11":"tag-pa","12":"tag-pennsylvania","13":"tag-philadelphia","14":"tag-united-states","15":"tag-united-states-of-america","16":"tag-unitedstates","17":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","18":"tag-us","19":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115550874870905551","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/379512","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=379512"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/379512\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/379513"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=379512"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=379512"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=379512"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}