In the thick of the election season, you may be noticing an increase in political texts.
"You know, this time of the year now, as we're entering that political stage of the year, we're all getting political texts," said Gerald Kasulis, the vice president of business operations for NORD Security.
A call-blocking service called Robokiller estimates that Americans nationwide received 253 million political robotexts in December 2023.
If you've been getting texts from candidates looking for money even though you think you didn't give them your number, you may have given them permission and not even know it.
"I personally get political texts, and what's interesting is I never actually signed up to any political parties or participated in terms of giving consent to receive those type of texts," Kasulis said.
So how do campaigns do this? Sometimes contact info is purchased from commercial data brokers.
But experts say that political committees and the companies that serve them also use voter registration records, which are available to anyone doing political communications. Those records include the name, addresses and contact information of every registered voter.
RELATED STORY | What is quishing? US Postal Inspection Service warns of new scam used to commit identity fraud
"Even though you might not have signed up to a certain political party, for instance, or subscribe to their reach out, there are different means of acquiring data and, data is easily being sold and shared between different organizations or parent companies," Kasulis said.
So, what rules govern political texts? The Federal Do Not Call Registry offers no protection from campaign-related calls or texts.
Robokiller says politicians have been increasingly turning to texts and robocalls because they have higher engagement rates than traditional methods like TV ads.
Texting is also cheap. In some cases, it can be as little as one cent per message.
How to stop political texts
Experts say to text "stop" or unsubscribe from those texts, but also say not to just stop there.
After you reply stop, then block the number. You can also go to the "messages" settings on your phone and filter out text messages from anyone not in your contact list.
And if you don't want political texts in the future, you can change your voter registration documents and remove your phone number.
If you receive a text you think breaks FCC rules, report it by forwarding the text to "7726," which spells out the word "spam."
