Android does a great job of handling spam incoming SMS messages. But there are two things you may have to do manually. The first is to delete unwanted SMS messages. Given the constant avalanche of spam flooding our various inboxes, those messages can add up. You certainly don't want to allow your device to fill up with blocked spam messages.
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The second thing you may have to do is add blocked numbers manually. Android does a good job of detecting and blocking spam numbers, but it doesn't always do it 100%.
So how do you delete those messages and add new blocked numbers? I'll show you how.
what you will need
The first thing you will need is an Android device. It should at least run Android 10, but Android 11 would be better. You will also need to have collected some unwanted SMS messages. If you haven't received that first spam message yet, consider yourself lucky and simply catalog this information for that inevitable day when the spam starts arriving.
How to remove SMS spam
The first thing we will do is delete some of those spam SMS messages that you have collected. It's a very simple process but can be tedious (since there's no option to select everything yet – Google, are you listening?).
To delete your spam messages, open the Messages app. From the main window, tap the menu button and then tap “Spam & Blocked.”
In the Spam & Blocked window, you'll need to manually tap each message you want to delete.
The trick to selecting messages is that you must first press and hold one of the messages to select it. Once you've selected that first message, you can go through the list and tap each one to select it. After selecting all the messages you want to delete, tap the trash can at the top right to delete the messages.
After tapping the trash, you will be asked to confirm the deletion. Tap Delete and the messages will disappear from the Locked & Junk folder in Messages.
SEE: How to record a phone call on Android in 5 ways
How to manually add a phone number to Spam and Blocked
Now, we will manually add a new phone number to the Spam and Blocked list. From the same screen, tap the menu button and then tap Blocked Contacts. In the resulting window, tap Add a number.
Type the number you want to add and tap Block.
And that's it; You just added a new number to the Android Messages blocked number list. You will never have to worry about receiving SMS messages from that number again.
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