ORLANDO, Fla. – The nation’s robocalling trend topped the 5 billion mark in October, with an estimated 500 million of those calls linked to health insurance impostors.
Alex Quilici, CEO of California-based YouMail.com, told News 6 the latest robocall total was far beyond anything he had imagined.
“I’m in the business and I’m surprised," Quilici said. “Every time we think the robocall epidemic has peaked, it turns out it hasn’t.”
The data is based on the number of calls reported to staff and calculated in the YouMail Robocall Index, launched in 2015.
According to Quilici, the number of calls in October more than doubled those made in January. That volume equaled some 170 million calls placed every day during October, or “1,973 robocalls for every second of the month -- both new records.”
YouMail told News 6 the combined scam and telemarketing calls continued to account for an estimated 60 percent of all robocalls, with over 2.1 billion scam calls, and well over 3 billion combined calls made in October.
The health insurance schemes have been a major theme on the robocall circuit, something Quilici attributes to the health care enrollment season.
“They figure, if you answer the phone and punch '1' to learn more, you’re a sitting duck,” Quilici said. “They ask for a bunch of personal information you normally feel very comfortable giving to your insurance agent. They say 'thank you very much' and now you’re in trouble.”
The top five scam profiles remained identical between September and October. The call themes seem to be on a cycle: easy money scams, interest rate scams and search listing scams declined.
Rank Type of Scam Estimated Sept Robocalls Summary of Scam
1 Health/ Insurance Scams 499.8m (+91 million) Identify theft/scam payments
2 Easy Money Scams 144.4m (-43 million) Pay to make money/get job
3 Interest Rate Scams 132.3m (-14 million) Identity theft
4 Student Loan Scams 101.7m (+27 million) Identify theft/scam payments
5 Search Listing Scams 100.8 m (-13 million) Pay to maintain search listing