My phone number is already on multiple lists like that; I get a minimum of three spam phone calls a day. I don't think that answering or not-answering is going to make a significant dent.

> Personally I have the "Silence Unknown Numbers," feature on my iPhone always toggled on. All unknown ..not in my contacts already..I never hear or see calling.. I might see I missed their call but my mind ignores missed call.

I have a young child, in school and after-school activities; I don't want to risk missing a relevant phone call, as well as phone calls from actual doctors & such who need to get in touch with me. (And I can't easily whitelist every phone number some given office/person might end up using to reach me.)

I'd love to do this but too often a call is made by an unknown number to me in response to an action, e.g i requested a dishwasher repair via email, i was called to schedule it by the contractor it was assigned to by my landlord. If i ignored that call it's likely a game of chasing them back up and potentially navigating PBX systems, etc

I find that caller-id works pretty well for these kinds of expected unknown calls for me. But that might just be a Singapore thing? (Or perhaps it's an Android thing, and Google looks up the number? Not sure.)

I believe it's a Google thing, which i have turned off because i don't need every call being sent to them for a minor convenience

They can leave a voicemail.

This is usually the way, but still, it's often more difficult than answering when they call