Telecom Operators Responsible For Most Spam Calls & Spam SMS In Nigeria, Other African Countries

According to a recent publication by Truecaller, three African countries are amongst the top 20 countries in the world affected by spam calls in 2019.

The countries are South Africa, Nigeria, and Egypt which ranked 6th,18th, and 20th respectively.

Each of the three countries witnessed an average of 25.2, 8.4, and 7.9 spam calls per month respectively. And the interesting bit is the fact that the bulk of those spam calls came from network operators.

Similarly, for countries affected by spam SMS in 2019, Nigeria took the cake by coming in 7th place globally with 65 spam SMS per month. Ethiopia, South Africa, and Kenya also made the world rankings with a total of nine African countries appearing on Truecaller’s study on countries where spam SMS is most rampant.

Across the globe, network operators are regarded as the biggest culprits responsible for spam calls and SMS but the numbers in Nigeria appear to be relatively high.

The last time Nigeria appeared on the list was in 2017 but in a short two-year period, spamming by operators has grown from 61 percent to 85 percent. Scam calls accounted for 12 percent, and telemarketing, 3 percent.

The data for this report was gathered from calls marked as spam by users or numbers automatically flagged by Truecaller during the period of January 1st, 2019 to October 30th, 2019.

The caller ID app claimed to have identified 116 billion spam calls and 8.6 billion spam SMS in 2019, and it is safe to say that emerging markets experienced more instances of spam calls and SMS than other countries.

This increase is in spite of the introduction of the Do-Not-Disturb (DND) rule which is meant to halt the spate of unwanted messages being sent to mobile phone users.