2021 Sees More Scam Calls Than Ever Before

Almost a quarter of Americans (23%) have reported losing money to a phone scam in the past year, according to Truecaller Insights US Spam & Scam Report 2021. The actual percentage of people who have fallen for a scam, whether or not they've given money, is 31%.

Truecaller estimates that in total, Americans lost $29.8 billion, with an average of $502. Expanding, Truecaller says that 60% of these calls were robocalls instead of actual humans.

"Attempted scam calls hit record highs in 2021," said Jon Freier, president of T-Mobile's consumer group.

A recent report put out by mobile carrier T-Mobile stated that scam calls grew by 116% this past year. The company released its T-Mobile Scam Shield this past year, which identifies and blocks calls from reported scam numbers. In 2021, the app blocked 21 billion scam calls. Note that this is just those using TMobile as a carrier. AT&T's Active Armor app blocked 16 billion calls, while Verizon's call filtering blocked 13 billion.

According to the T-Mobile report, there is a drop in the number of calls on the weekends. According to Truecaller, the average number of spam calls per month was 31.

The top phone scam of 2021? False vehicle warranties. Other popular scams included posing as the Social Security office, as a telephone provider, a car insurance company, or Amazon.

Here's one interesting figure from the Truecaller report: Younger men and women are more susceptible to losing money through a phone scam than older generations. Surprisingly, men between the ages of 35-44 were by far the highest percentage of scam victims, with men between 18-34 coming in at second.