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While spam calls and text messages remain an irritating daily nuisance, a recent report suggests that many mobile numbers end up in marketers' hands simply because users rush through consent forms and click unchecked agreement boxes.
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The findings, published by technology outlet Engadget on Saturday, outlined the primary channels through which personal phone numbers are acquired by telemarketers and fraudsters.
In many instances, data leaks stem from straightforward misfortune—such as when a legitimate platform where a user registered their contact details falls victim to a cyberattack or data breach.
Robocallers also harvest contact information by dialing randomly generated numbers or scraping public registries, including court directories, property deeds, and corporate filings.
Even consumers registered with statutory do-not-call lists may still receive calls from legally exempt organizations, such as registered charities, political campaigns, debt-collection agencies, and market-research firms.
It further stated that most numbers held by telemarketers and scammers are bought from data brokers, often after users rushed through pages with confusingly designed checkboxes to sign up for accounts, reward programs, contests, or lotteries.
In some cases, users are caught by phishing scams, entering details on fake login pages, signing up on suspicious sites, answering bogus job ads, or registering for sham apps and services.
The report further warned that a phone number may already have been sold once it is used to register for anything.
Four ways to keep spam calls away
Among the simplest steps to keep a line of defense is joining the official Do-Not-Call Registers by calling the Communications Authority's hotline at 1835 000.
Once registration takes effect after 10 working days, users are protected from prerecorded calls, SMS, and faxes—but not live sales calls.
Citizens can also turn on built-in filters, naming "Silence Unknown Callers" or "Screen Unknown Callers" on iPhones and "Caller ID and spam protection" on Android to block spam from coming.
Third-party apps such as Whoscall, Call Defender, and Truecaller are available to identify, label, or block junk calls.
Additionally, mobile operators will offer free or paid add-ons, including network-level blocking of anonymous or withheld numbers.
Users are also advised against calling back silent or one-ring calls, which scammers use to test whether a number is active and, in some cases, to record voice samples.
Hiding one's number on social media also helps, as does reading the terms—which lets users untick any box consenting to the sale or sharing of personal data.
Free check for email leaks
Considering phone numbers are often tied to online accounts through email addresses, a leaked email can expose a number to phishing, credential-stuffing attacks, fake customer-service messages, and identity theft.
To find out whether a linked number has been breached, users can turn to a free site, Have I Been Pwned, founded by security expert Troy Hunt.
Requiring no password, the site shows results quickly once users enter their email—in red or green.
For breached emails, the site lists the site involved, the year, and the type of data exposed, including names, phone numbers, addresses, or password hashes.
While appearing in a breach database does not necessarily indicate that an active account has been hijacked, affected users are advised to update compromised passwords, configure multi-factor authentication (MFA), sign out of unfamiliar active sessions, and stay alert to suspicious correspondence.
