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Comment by dfawcus | Hacker News Reader

So having read this, the answer seemed obvious:

Send a text (iMessage) to myself on the phone. Then look at it, and block my own number. The phone then reported it would block calls, FaceTime, messages from my own number.

Since I don't expect to ever need to call/message/FaceTime myself, that seems like a zero cost solution.

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I'd be more worried about these spam texts coming from my number to my own contacts that I have previous conversations with than to myself. E.g. why wouldn't my grandmother click some link I sent to her? (My first thought was that these texts could just be from some malware on the phone itself, possibly with access to the contacts. But if it's actually an externally sourced spoof, that's obviously less dangerous...unless they somehow got my contacts I guess)

The main issue is OTHER people getting spam calls or texts from your personal number.

I got one of the Android stock text messages last week for when you auto-respond to a missed call. 'sorry can't speak right now' from a phone number I never called.

So a spam caller used my phone # to call, the person auto hung up with a response, and the real text message went back to my phone... It's absurd.

This will prevent your texts from syncing between your phone and other devices, like a MacBook. I learned this the hard way by debugging a relative’s text-syncing issue.

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