If you’re sick of being interrupted by a daily barrage of spam texts (a true hazard for most Americans this election year), Apple fans have discovered quick fix.
A simple one-flip toggle in your iPhone‘s Settings app will help you filter out spam messages automatically — lining them up for rapid-fire deletion.
Apple users on Reddit have been raving about the filter and delete hack all week.
‘How am I, a person who’s been using Apple devices since forever, just now learning this one trick?!?’ one posted to the discussion on the site’s r/iPhone group.
A simple one-flip toggle in your iPhone’s Settings app, ‘Filter Unknown Senders,’ will help you filter out spam messages automatically — lining them up for rapid-fire deletion
‘How am I, a person who’s been using Apple devices since forever, just now learning this one trick?!?’ one Apple user posted to the discussion on Reddit’s r/iPhone group
The strategy, as laid out by Reddit user SpecialistSeesaw650, is simple: First go into your iPhone’s Settings app and flip on the ‘Filter Unknown Senders’ switch.
The route is Settings > Messages > Filter Unknown Senders.
‘This way, it’ll sort messages from people who aren’t on your contacts list into a separate list,’ SpecialistSeesaw650 wrote.
‘You’ll see you have a message but you can just swipe left on it to delete it.’
But there are a few additional steps to make it truly convenient, according to Apple users who swear by the hack.
iPhone owners will likely want to add more numbers into their contacts as a result, including the five digit numbers that their banks or other services use to send them two-factor authentication (2FA) codes.
Next, users will want to visit Settings > Notifications > Messages > Customize Notifications and toggle off ‘unknown senders,’ cutting off spam’s ability to bug you.
When you’re ready to review, or mass delete, your unwanted texts there’s a quick hack there too.
‘Just learned you can swipe up or down with two fingers over messages and delete massive amounts of them in seconds,’ one user poster to r/iPhone. ‘Or just select all and delete.’
But there is also a new menu option to report or block junk on each of these messages as you review them.
‘Also at the end of every unknown number messages they’ll let you know that the number is not in your contacts list and you can report it as junk as well as block it,’ SpecialistSeesaw650 noted.
Other Tips
– Make sure you unsubscribe to any spam that has already come through
– For iPhone users, make sure you are only looking at your ‘Known Senders’ Messages inbox or you will still see spam messages filtering through
– Never click on an unknown link to reduce phishing risk
