How to Block SMS Spam on iOS 11

SMS spam is one thing that plagues just about everybody who has an Indian SIM card, and even those that reside overseas. Be it frauds, asking you to purchase shares in corporations to double your wealth, or simply your neighbourhood retailer sending promotional messages, these messages get extra annoying by the day. Not solely do they spam you with notifications, these texts additionally get in the best way of iMessage since Apple’s messaging service additionally makes use of the identical Messages app.

This implies that you’re higher off eliminating these spam messages. You may simply do that in iOS 9 however on iOS 10 that methodology stopped working. Your solely possibility was to disable notifications for these messages manually. That’s fairly a tiring activity, however with iOS 11, third-party apps might help you get the job completed fairly simply.

Before you begin blocking SMS spam, you want to bear in mind that the third-party apps you employ to clear up this drawback will likely be in a position to learn your messages. If your privateness is essential to you, this might be a difficulty. Be certain to learn the privateness coverage of the app and see if the developer seems dependable and has different apps with good critiques as nicely. Note that this doesn’t have an effect on iMessage in any approach, as these apps can solely learn SMS and MMS messages.

How to block SMS spam on iOS 11
These steps will allow you to block spam texts on iOS 11:

1. Download an SMS spam blocking app (we’ve talked about our favourites beneath).
2. Go to Settings > Messages.
3. Under Message Filtering, faucet Unknown & Spam.
4. Under SMS Filtering, choose the spam blocking app you need to use.

SMS spam blocking apps on iOS 11
There are a number of SMS spam blocking apps on the App Store and we used lots of them for the reason that launch of iOS 11 to determine which of them work the very best. These three apps are our favourites.

SMS Shield

SMS Shield is a subscription-based app (Rs. 300 per 12 months) that permits you to block spam messages each manually and utilizing its personal machine studying algorithms. SMS Shield labored fairly nicely for us general and blocked extra spam texts than different apps. It helps blocking by receivers as nicely, so you’ll be able to block all texts originating from shortcodes equivalent to “VK-HLACHF” by including *-HLACHF as a blocked quantity below the Custom Block List characteristic. There’s no straightforward approach to create a whitelist, however you’ll be able to report particular person messages as not spam by pasting the textual content within the app.

SMS Checker
SMS Checker is a free app for those who simply need to block texts manually through key phrases. There’s an in-app buy (Rs. 500) to allow on-line filters for computerized blocking. If a subscription primarily based blocking app will not be for you, then you’ll be able to pay a one-time in-app buy and get SMS Checker. The app makes it very straightforward to create a whitelist and a blacklist, with a number of toggles for customized key phrases within the message or within the title of the sender. Its computerized spam message blocking isn’t nearly as good as that of SMS Shield, however that would change primarily based on how many individuals use the app, and the way usually its filters get up to date.

VeroSMS

(*11*) is a free app that allows you to block spam messages through focused key phrases. An in-app buy value Rs. 80 enables you to block texts primarily based on crowdsourced key phrases. If you don’t need to pay a lot, this app does an incredible job blocking spam messages as lengthy you’ve got the endurance to manually enter key phrases to block. These key phrases can be the title of a sender equivalent to HLACHF or DUNKIN and the app will put them within the junk folder. VeroSMS is competent at getting the job completed, however the issue is that you’ve got to do a lot of the work.

We tried fairly a couple of different apps that didn’t make the minimize right here for varied causes. The most blatant alternative right here is Truecaller, whose USP is obstructing spam calls and messages. Surprisingly sufficient nonetheless, this app failed to block spam messages in our exams. Another individual was in a position to independently confirm this too, so in the meanwhile we will’t suggest it. Other apps we tried however didn’t like a lot had been SMS Blocker (ugly interface) and SMS Filter (has advertisements for those who don’t pay).

Which is your favorite SMS spam blocking app on iOS 11? Let us know through the feedback.