Spam goes mobile

Unwanted email marketing, aka spam, is one of the biggest annoyances of being online. As an Internet user, you fight the spread of it to your email inbox through the use of spam filters and special software designed to keep your inbox clear of these messages. But now spam is moving beyond the Internet and infiltrating your phone, making protecting yourself from these unwanted messages not as simple as using a filter.

According to the 2010 report Cell Phones and American Adults by the Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project, 57% of adult cell phone users have received text message spam.  The Cellular Telephone Industries Association (CTIA) estimates that there are almost 293 million wireless subscribers in the United States, suggesting that more than 167 million wireless subscribers have dealt with text message spam.

How text message spam works

If you’re one of the lucky few who hasn’t been spammed on your mobile device, it could happen soon and it is much more obtrusive than email spam. While most Web- and software-based email programs have easy-to-use spam filters that only require you to move the message to a specified spam folder, it’s not as simple with text message spam.

Once the spammer sends out a text message to your device, you receive an alert like you would when any other text message is received. Like most users, you take time out of your day to check the message because you’re used to all of these messages coming from family, friends and even those you do business with. Instead, like what a majority of text message spam victims find, you end up reading a sales pitch about lowering debt relief (Sullivan, 2010). The message asks you to visit a Web address, send a text message in return, or even call a specified number. So, like most people, you delete the message.

Even though you’ve deleted the mobile spam, the problem is far from over. If the text message spam wasn’t a part of your text message plan with your wireless carrier, receiving that one text message may add up to $.20 per message on your next bill (Sullivan, 2010). And, since the text message isn’t easily blocked through a dedicated folder or filter like with email, you could continue to incur charges and therefore continue to be interrupted.

Stop text message spam

Although it’s currently not possible to block all text message spammers, unless you opt out of text messages all together, there may be relief coming soon.

On April 2, 2009, Sen. Olympia Snowe introduced the m-SPAM Act of 2009. This proposed legislation, currently in the first step of the legislative process, would ban text message spamming to those mobile users that are registered to the National Do-Not-Call Registry. While this measure would help mobile users, as Govtrack.us notes, most bills never make it out of these beginning stages.

To protect yourself from text message spam in the mean time, NYTimes.com blogger David Pogue suggests you use your wireless carrier’s text message spam control features that can be found using the chart below. Once set-up, you can reduce the amount of text message spam and start to regain control of your text message inbox.

How to stop text message spam

1 How to Block Cellphone Spam: AT&T
2 Verizon Wireless Spam Controls
3 Block or unblock an email address or short code from sending you a text message using My Sprint
4 T-Mobile Message Blocking

References

Lenhart, A. (2010, September 2). Why adults call on cell phones. Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project. Retrieved from http://www.pewinternet.org/Reports/2010/Cell-Phones-and-American-Adults/Part-2-Cell-phone-communication-patterns/Why-adults-call-on-cell-phones.aspx

Pogue, D. (2008, June 12). How to Block Cellphone Spam. Pogue's Posts Blog. Retrieved from http://pogue.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/06/12/how-to-block-cellphone-spam/

S. 788: m-SPAM Act of 2009. (2009, April 2). GovTrack.us. Retrieved from http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=s111-788

Sullivan, B. (2010, November 9). A look inside the new world of txt msg spam. The Red Tape Chronicles. Retrieved from http://redtape.msnbc.com/2010/11/next-debt-help-nuisance-text-message-spam.html

U.S. Wireless Quick Facts. (n.d.). CTIA - The Wireless Association. Retrieved from http://www.ctia.org/media/industry_info/index.cfm/AID/10323