Note: There are several ways to do this, I don’t claim this way is better, it’s the way I do it because it’s free and doesn’t require adding any apps to your phone.
Caveats: Your mileage may vary depending on which phone you have. I have an iPhone 6. Time to accomplish depends on how many contacts you have in your address book. It took me about an hour.
If you’re like me you get a lot of unknown, unwanted calls on yout phone. These not only are aggravating and waste your time but you can also accidentally give out information you don’t want to give out. This post outlines how I did it for free without adding any new apps to my phone and without buying any ring times…
Believe it ot not, the iPhone comes with ALMOST all of the things you need to complete this. The most important thing you need is a completely silent audio file that’s less than 10 seconds long. You can make this and put it on your phone using iTunes as a ring-tone. There are descriptions of how to make ring-tones and put them on your phone on the Internet, I won’t describe how to do that but I used a free open-source program called Audacity to accomplish the task (Recall I use Audacity to digitize my vinyl records from time to time).
The steps to do this from start to finish are:
1. Create a silent audio file for your ring-tone.
2. Convert it to the file format for a ring-tone
3. Sync it to your phone using iTunes.
4. Make the silent ring-tone your default ringer.
5. Assign ringtones to ALL of your contacts. I have 3 tones to distinguish between Family, Friends, and Acquaintances. (this is the most time consuming part).
6. Record a new greeting. Mine is something like this:
1. Create a silent audio file for your ring-tone.
2. Convert it to the file format for a ring-tone
3. Sync it to your phone using iTunes.
4. Make the silent ring-tone your default ringer.
5. Assign ringtones to ALL of your contacts. I have 3 tones to distinguish between Family, Friends, and Acquaintances. (this is the most time consuming part).
6. Record a new greeting. Mine is something like this:
HELLO
You’ve reached the voicemail of Tom Cardinal,If you’re hearing this message I don’t recognize your number or am unable to answer. If you’d like me to call you back please leave your name, number and a brief message.Thank you
7. You’re finished.
So here’s how it works:
– If a person on your contacts list calls your phone will ring. If you don’t answer they’ll get the greeting and will usually leave a message.
– If a person NOT on your contacts list calls they’ll hear the ringback but your phone will play the silent ring-tone until it goes to your voicemail greeting… They’ll get the greeting and will probably leave a message if the call is a valid call. If the call is a valid call you can add them to your contacts and assign a ringtone.
– If a number is NOT on your contacts list and it’s a scammer they may leave a message but you already know (and they probably do too) you won’t call them back… They might leave a message… but you can delete it… the only risk is if they fill your voice mailbox so it can’t receive more messages until you delete some of them.
– If a person on your contacts list calls your phone will ring. If you don’t answer they’ll get the greeting and will usually leave a message.
– If a person NOT on your contacts list calls they’ll hear the ringback but your phone will play the silent ring-tone until it goes to your voicemail greeting… They’ll get the greeting and will probably leave a message if the call is a valid call. If the call is a valid call you can add them to your contacts and assign a ringtone.
– If a number is NOT on your contacts list and it’s a scammer they may leave a message but you already know (and they probably do too) you won’t call them back… They might leave a message… but you can delete it… the only risk is if they fill your voice mailbox so it can’t receive more messages until you delete some of them.
This works VERY well for me, Today alone I’ve received 9 calls from the same number in South Dakota but there are no voicemail messages from any of the call. I’m sharing here so others can shut the scammers down too.