It’s estimated that nearly 90 percent of people receive some form of “nuisance” call each month and 13 percent of U.S. adults have been the victim of a telephone scam. Almost half of those scammed reported losing between $100 and $10,000 and four percent losing more than $10,000. CPR Call Blocker commissioned a survey by YouGov to identify the top five nuisance calls that occurred in 2016. While not all calls are scams, the most common unwanted communications were robocalls at 66 percent with credit card solicitations and loan arrangers coming in second at 28 percent. People have become wary of telephone requests for money and the survey noted that the number three top nuisance call was charities at 23 percent. Surprisingly, there are still a number of calls coming in from telephone and long-distance providers who landed at number four on the list with 11 percent, and close behind was lottery and sweepstakes calls at 10 percent. This continues to be a major problem, said Kris Kicks of CPR Call Blocker. It is often the most vulnerable people in our society who don’t just ignore or block these calls, but fall victim to the ones that are telephone scams.
