# Do Spam Calls Increase with Age?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-spam-calls-increase-with-age/1032831
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [September 4, 2026, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-spam-calls-increase-with-age/1032831 "2026-09-04T23:39:08Z")
**Posts on this page:** 15
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Tj54](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tj54)
#### Post date: [September 4, 2026, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-spam-calls-increase-with-age/1032831/1 "2026-09-04T23:39:08Z")
I recently turned 72 and celebrated my birthday by receiving over 20 spam calls to my cell phone. I expect a few daily, since my number is out there as a Realtor and having another business, but this was over the top. Ever since, I’ve been receiving about twice as many as I did prior to my birthday.
Do they think because I had another birthday I’m more likely to fall for their AI cons and schemes?
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### Author:  [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2026, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-spam-calls-increase-with-age/1032831/2 "2026-09-05T00:38:11Z")
It’s the time of the year for renewing or changing Medicare Supplement and Advantage plans. Open enrollment runs from mid-October to early December. They know you’re over 65; the fact that it’s your birthday is just a coincidence.
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### Author:  [@whitetho](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/whitetho)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2026, 1:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-spam-calls-increase-with-age/1032831/3 "2026-09-05T01:16:39Z")
I am 2 years younger than you, and recently had a huge increase in the number of spam calls on my landline, up to an estimated 50 per day. Interestingly, the calls never come before 9:00 a.m or after 8:30 p.m., and rarely during weekends.
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### Author:  [@Lare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lare)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2026, 7:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-spam-calls-increase-with-age/1032831/4 "2026-09-05T07:35:13Z")
That’s because Federal law allows marketing phone calls only between the hours of 8 AM and 9 PM. However, some states place additional restrictions on telemarketing calling hours. Be thankful for small favors.
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### Author:  [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2026, 8:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-spam-calls-increase-with-age/1032831/5 "2026-09-05T08:48:56Z")
I started getting a dozen or so calls on my landline telephone. I now never pick up the telephone. I have a message that says I’m not there but they can leave a message. Most of the callers don’t leave a message. The remaining ones leave a message of a few seconds before hanging up.
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### Author:  [@FairyChatMom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FairyChatMom)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2026, 11:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-spam-calls-increase-with-age/1032831/6 "2026-09-05T11:51:08Z")
For me (I’m 72) spam calls seem to show up in spurts. For a while, I was getting several a day from numbers where the area code and exchange were the same, but the last 4 digits varied among 5 or 6 repeats. They all went right to voice mail, and after a couple of weeks, they stopped.
More recently, calls have tapered down to maybe a couple a week, and my phone flags them as _Suspected Spam_. I’m wondering if I get pulled off lists because I don’t answer. FWIW, I have ring tones on my phone set up in 3 sets - one for friends and family on my contact list, one for businesses I deal with, including doctors and such, and the default, which always gets ignored. On the rare occasion that the default ring is legit, the caller leaves a message and I move the number to the correct ring. It’s worked well for me.
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### Author:  [@GaryM](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GaryM)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2026, 1:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-spam-calls-increase-with-age/1032831/7 "2026-09-05T13:01:31Z")
I’m 80 and get spam calls just like all of you. My cell phone often indicates “possible spam”. Those just get a flick of the reject button. As I’m a director of a local organization, I always answer the others. Sometimes in German or Spanish. As I only know a few phrases, those calls don’t last long.
If I answer at all, sometimes I hear s “bloop” sound as the call is switched to the available call center worker. I hang up at that point.
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### Author:  [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2026, 1:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-spam-calls-increase-with-age/1032831/8 "2026-09-05T13:33:31Z")
This is an interesting thread, if you haven’t read it:
Scam (Internet and Otherwise) Omnibus Thread
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### Author:  [@Thumper668](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thumper668)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2026, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-spam-calls-increase-with-age/1032831/9 "2026-09-05T13:40:01Z")
I’m 58 and I get 5-10 loan scam calls per day. It started about a year ago. I have my phone set to send unknown callers to voicemail, but unfortunately there’s no way to turn off voicemail. I have considered just leaving them until my voicemail is full, but I don’t know how many of them that will take - certainly more than the 50 or so that are still in there. In any event, I don’t think it’s age related - if your number is out there you’re going to get scam calls.
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### Author:  [@Tamerlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamerlane)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2026, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-spam-calls-increase-with-age/1032831/10 "2026-09-05T15:19:45Z")
I still have a secondary landline, legacy of what had previously been pretty bad cell reception where I live (to this day there is still only one cell provider that is reliable in my home). It has a little marginal use in emergencies and some legacy use as a phone number I used to use for certain business/commercial purposes back when I still tried to separate my cell number as my purely private number and to screen my messages (yes, I eventually gave up on that policy). I’ll probably abandon it for good when/if AT&T wins in court and locally phases out copper to force a VOIP replacement in 2027. In the meantime it attracts a fair bit of spam of all sorts.
My cell phone by contrast has been blissfully and surprisingly pretty spam-free \*. Until recently. What changed? Well, I retired recently and since my current retiree dental insurance benefits are a bit of a joke I took the option of COBRAing my old employment benefits for the allowed 18 months. One year in, almost to the day, and suddenly I am positively besieged on my cell with spam for “affordable dental insurance” 😀. They’re clever little monkeys, those scammers/spammers.
- Well, except for one person on the other side of the country that uses my cell phone number, that I’ve deduced used to belong to her dad so she memorized it, to give out to political pollsters and local businesses she doesn’t want bothering her. Good on her for being politically active. But I do get tired of calls and texts from Democrat candidates on the opposite side of the continent asking for her support or realtors wondering if she is still home-shopping in the same area.
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### Author:  [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2026, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-spam-calls-increase-with-age/1032831/11 "2026-09-05T17:28:55Z")
I began getting spam texts after I donated to two Democratic candidates. At first it was apparently every Democratic candidate in all fifty states; then it spread to general spam. I believe someone shared the list of people who donated the two I gave money to, and someone sold or stole the list.
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### Author:  [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2026, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-spam-calls-increase-with-age/1032831/12 "2026-09-05T18:17:24Z")
Getting to Medicare age definitely increases the amount of scam calls. Please take caution with these calls. If they tell you that you need to give them more information to get on the “Medicare database” hang up. If you’re getting benefits, you are already in their database. Medicare will never cold call you.
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### Author:  [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2026, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-spam-calls-increase-with-age/1032831/13 "2026-09-05T18:19:22Z")
> [@Kent\_Clark](#):
>
> It’s the time of the year for renewing or changing Medicare Supplement and Advantage plans. Open enrollment runs from mid-October to early December. They know you’re over 65; the fact that it’s your birthday is just a coincidence.
Yep. Also of course, con artists mostly prey on the elderly, not the greedy rich as shown in films.
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### Author:  [@Horatio\_Hellpop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatio_Hellpop)
#### Post date: [September 6, 2026, 2:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-spam-calls-increase-with-age/1032831/14 "2026-09-06T02:54:33Z")
A decade ago, I answered a help wanted ad for an insurance company. It turned out to be a high pressure boiler room sales position that sold dodgy financial services explicitly to the elderly. (I took a pass.) When I turned 64 last year they sent me e-mail trying to attract me as a client. This year, I unwittingly gave my age and e-mail to someone I shouldn’t have, and got blitzed with spam phone calls. Yes, they target the elderly.
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### Author:  [@LurkMeister](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LurkMeister)
#### Post date: [September 6, 2026, 1:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-spam-calls-increase-with-age/1032831/15 "2026-09-06T13:52:46Z")
I keep getting calls (when I actually answer the phone instead of letting it go to my answering machine) from people who have “reviewed my Medicare records” and wanted to make me aware that I can get grocery store credit. I researched this and fond out that this involves signing up for a Medicare Part C policy. I have no interest in doing so, since I already have secondary coverage through my former Federal employment which covers just about everything that Medicare A & B covers.