Why you’re being flooded with calls in your area code—and how to stop them

The robocall epidemic is now hitting closer to home.

More than half of spam calls in 2018 so far have come from a “neighbor scam” — a tactic in which scammers replicate the first six digits of your own phone number down to the area code to trick you into answering a call, an analysis from spam protection company Hiya found.

Many users assume they may know the person calling and are more likely to answer if the number resembles their own. Hiya examined 4.3 billion calls each month and found 56.7% of them used the trick. Some 90% of scam calls show up as U.S. numbers when they are likely originating from other countries, according to Truecaller, a caller ID and spam blocking app.

“Robocalls are getting more sophisticated by the day and the recent rise of neighbor spoofing is yet another trick to get unsuspecting people to answer the phone and one of the most effective to date,” Nick Larrson, head of growth at Truecaller said. “The more people that pick up these calls, the more lucrative it becomes for the scammers, and the sheer increase in volume is affecting more victims today than every before.”

The trend is just the latest evolution in the ongoing spam call crisis: The number of robocalls reached a record in April, with 3.36 billion calls placed, a 6.5% increase from March and the highest robocall rate to date, according to voicemail and call blocking app YouMail. That amounts to 1,297 calls placed each second or 112 million calls per day.

Here are the most common area codes being spoofed in the neighbor scam:

1. 602 — Phoenix

2. 214 — Dallas

3. 832 — Houston

4. 210 — San Antonio

5. 404 — Atlanta

6. 678 — Atlanta

7. 704 — Charlotte

8. 702 — Las Vegas

9. 623 — Phoenix

10. 407 — Orlando

Once a user answers the phone, fraudsters will scam them by saying there is a warrant out for their arrest or that they owe the Internal Revenue Service money. Other tactics include offering travel discounts or refinancing credit card debt. Generally, scammers create a false sense of urgency to get victims to pay up faster, experts at Hiya said.

The Federal Communication Commission and the Federal Trade Commission have said they are working towards solutions, even holding contests to develop better robocall blocking tools. In May, the FCC fined a telemarketing operation $120 million, its largest forfeiture ever, for scams including “neighbor spoofing.”

“Our decision sends a loud and clear message: this FCC is an active cop on the beat and will throw the book at anyone who violates our spoofing and robocall rules and harms consumers,” Ajit Pai, chairman of the FCC, said in a statement.

Those affected by the robocall influx can fight the problem by using blocking services like YouMail, Hiya, NoMoRobo, and Next Caller. Experts also suggest never answering calls from an unknown number and obviously blocking numbers that are known to be spam.