Author: Raymond

I am Raymond Oglesby, an Information Technology (IT) specialist with 30 years in the field. I have taught Microsoft Applications and troubleshot computers in 15 countries and many States. My career was focused on mainframes and desktops from application development to implementation. I have written hundreds of programs for various architectures. I decided to start a blog to share my knowledge and experiences with you. I plan on updating this blog at least twice a week about smart phone apps to Windows. Please feel free to leave a Comment or Tweet. I would love to hear from you. Do you have a computer tech question? I will do my best to answer your inquiry. Please mention the app and version that you are using. To help me out, you can send screenshots of your data related to your question.

How to Find Out Who Is Calling You

This post discusses how to identify legitimate calls and avoid scammers, addressing phone verification, spoofed numbers, and web searching. It provides options like reverse phone lookup websites and tools like WhoCallsMe, Spy Dialer, PeopleFinders, and USPhoneBook. It also suggests utilizing mobile carrier solutions, reporting to the FTC, and the National Do Not Call Registry to combat spam calls.

RAYMOND OGLESBY @RaymondOglesby2
June 11, 2024

This is for any browser on a desktop, laptop, or smartphone. Screenshots are from Google Chrome on Windows 10

The phone rings and it’s a number you do not recognize. Or perhaps an unknown number shows up in your missed calls. You are curious but do not want to pick up or call back if it’s a telemarketer or scammer. Instead of playing robocall roulette let’s explore five ways to see who is calling before you engage.

Legit Verses Scam Calls

You may have noticed that America has a problem with scam calls. Scammers took $10 billion from unsuspecting victims in 2023, and it’s hard to see the problem going away anytime soon. If you get a call, there are a few ways to tell if it’s legit or not.

What does the phone say? When a call comes in, look for a displayed number and location. If your phone is not showing any information and says something like Unknown, chances are there’s a scammer on the other end. Anyone can hide their number, but it’s best to let this one go to voicemail and call back if it’s someone you know. If the phone says Scam Likely, it’s typically correct; just ignore the call.
Look for verification. Carriers have started verifying phone numbers when you receive a call. Google’s phone app also adds a badge on incoming calls that can be attached to a business. Unfortunately, this does not verify every call from a legitimate business or weed out legitimate businesses that use robocalls.
Watch out for spoofed numbers. Have you ever gotten a call from what looks to be your own phone number, only it’s a few numbers off? Do not pick those calls up; scammers like to spoof phone numbers and trick you into picking up. They think you are more likely to pick up if the call is from your area code or someone you know.

Note! We recommend ou not click or tap on any icon off the main screen. These buttons launch web sites that may introduce malware or be blocked by your browser security. Also, any screen that has flashing items, immediately exit the screen.

If you click or tap on a button that starts a scanning process for addresses,emails, public information, criminal records, etc., the process will take several minutes. On the desktop, you can stop the process by hitting Cntl-Alt-Del keys, then select Task Manger. Next, right=-click on your browser entry and select End Task. Your browser will exit stopping the scanning process.

Search the Web

If you want to quickly know whether a caller is legit or a scammer, do a quick web search. As a rule of thumb, if the search results are primarily reverse phone lookup websites, it’s safe to say other people have received unwarranted calls from that same number and are reporting it to warn others. Refer to the below image:

Reverse Phone Lookup

Speaking of reverse phone lookups, if you want to do some digging about a certain phone number, many websites can help you. You usually have to pay to get any worthwhile information, but there are a few tools that can help you for free. Even though they are free if you want additional information about the phone number, the sites charge for their service.

whocallsme

At WhoCallsMe, users can report their experiences with specific phone numbers. Enter a number and the website will tell you where the area code is from. You can then enter your own report or view what others say about it. See the below image:

spy dialer

Spy Dialer allows you to search for phone numbers, names, addresses, and emails. Enter a phone number, then choose if you want to look up any linked names or photos, listen to the number’s outbound voicemail, or confirm if the number is spam or not. Spy Dialer can tell you with whom the number is registered, their general location, and whether or not the number has been reported as spam before.

For more information, click Phone Details to see how long the line has been in service and if the number is spoofed. Choose Hear Voicemail to get the caller’s outbound voicemail, if available. You can click Report Call to file a complaint with Spy Dialer.

We recommend this site over the others because it’s faster and offers more information. See the following image:

peoplefinders

PeopleFinders allows you to look up a phone number, name, address, or email. Enter a phone number into the search bar to get the caller’s general location, carrier, and phone type. More revealing information, such as the caller’s full name and address, is hidden requiring a fee. Refer to the below image:

usphonebook

You can look up phone numbers, names, and addresses at USPhoneBook, though this works better for identifying individuals rather than businesses. Enter a number to find the person connected to it. The site will display a list of people who may be related to the person. You can then mark the number as safe or spam. Keep in mind that these listings can be outdated.

Click Get Details to view extra information about the person. This will include their age, current (and former) addresses, phone numbers associated with them, a list of relatives and associates, and even related email addresses. See the below image:

What To Do Next

One option is to look at your mobile carrier’s anti-spam solutions for stopping spam calls and robo texts. Additionally, apps likeRoboKiller and Truecaller help keep the spam callers at bay. You can also report unwanted calls to the FTC and register your number with the National Do Not Call Registry, though those wishing to do you harm will undoubtedly ignore this. See the following image:

Calls You 6 — National Do Not Call Registry main screen

Disclaimer

Technology is always changing. Rarely is there static tech for smartphones and desktops. Thus, the contents of this post are only valid at the time of writing. Blog posts older than six months may have directions incompatible with your device or OS. Hopefully, older post content will continue to work as advertised. Thank you for reading TechSavvy.Life for Technology at Work For You.

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Jim Rohn

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How to Turn on iPhone Low Battery Mode

Low Power Mode on iPhone reduces features to save battery. To enable, go to Settings>Battery and toggle Low Power Mode on, or add it to Control Center for quick access.

RAYMOND OGLESBY @RaymondOglesby2
June 4, 2024

This is for the iPhone. Screenshots are from iPhone 14 Pro running iOS 17.5+

When Low Power Mode is enabled, the Battery icon at the top of your phone will appear yellow, and features like mail fetch, background app refresh, automatic downloads, and some visual effects will be reduced or disabled until it is turned off. There are two primary ways to turn on Low Power Mode.

Use Settings

First, open Settings and tap the Battery option. Refer to the below image:

Low Power 1 — Selecting the Battery option

Now, toggle the Low Power Mode to ON. See the below image:

Low Power 2 — Turning the Low Power Mode to ON

Use the Control Center

If you want quick and easy access to the Low Power Mode setting but do not want to go into your Settings and scroll to access it, let’s add it to your Control Center.

First, open Settings and tap the Control Center option. See the following image:

Low Power 3 — Selecting the Control Center option

Next, tap Low Power Mode to add it to your Control Center. (If you see a red minus sign instead of a green plus side here, it means Low Power Mode is already in your Control Center.) Refer to the below image:

Low Power 4 — Selecting to add Low Power Mode to Control Center

When added, the option will be in your Control Center. See the below image:

Low Power 5 — Low Power Mode added to Control Center

Next, swipe down from the top right of the screen. See the following image:

Low Power 6 — Accessing the Control Center by swiping down

Now, tap the Battery icon to toggle Low Power Mode ON or OFF. At the top of your screen, you will see the option status. Refer to the below image:

Low Power 7 — Toggle on pr pff Low Power Mode from the Control Center

What Does Low Power Mode Do

Your iPhone’s Low Power Mode does many things to save battery power. It automatically changes some settings to save battery power, like disabling the automatic fetching of new mail, reducing your screen brightness, and automatically locking the phone and powering off its display more quickly. Apps can detect low power mode is enabled and choose to disable animations and other battery-hungry features, too.

Motion effects and animated wallpapers are also disabled. Background activities and networking are paused to prevent unnecessary power drain in the background. Your iPhone even automatically reduces the performance of its CPU and GPU, which makes it perform a bit slower but saves battery life. Tests have found that this slows iPhones by about 40 percent when Low Power Mode is enabled.

By entering Low Power Mode you will save some battery life until you can get to your charger.