HARASSMENT VIA TEXT MESSAGES

Sounds like you're being spammed because the "phone number" is phony. Unfortunately there's not much you can do because of the constantly changing number, which is probably spoofed anyway. Just don't respond and they will eventually go away.

yep the worst thing you can do is answer the call or respond to the text,it only confirms to them yours is an active number and they sell it to other spammers

One thing with these new message alerts today, the spammers know when you open the text, just like when you are texting someone and you see "sent," "delivered," and "read" below your texts. The best thing to do for texts that you are unfamiliar with who may have sent them is to tap and hold on the text in your list before opening it and then select delete it from there. Doing it that way will keep them from seeing that the text was read. And then the possibility of at least some will go away. Especially those that come in showing that it was sent from an email address and not an actual phone number. Unfortunately, you cannot forward the text to SPAM(7726) from there, only if you accidentally open it. Even then, when I go through my AT&T Call Protect app and look at the numbers that I blocked from phone calls, there is not one number on my list that has ever made another attempt. They all read "0 Calls Blocked," which means that the number they used has never been used again. One thing that I found that happened to me one time was that I filled out to get some information on rental homes and it turned out to be a locally created phishing site that sold information to 3rd parties. I actually had to change my number and email address to stop the horrendous flood of emails, text messages, and spam/ fraud calls from coming in.

They dont eventually go away maybe in 3 years I get them sometimes 0 to 1 a day and some days dang near 20 in a day my blocked list is over 500 numbers and emails to say theres nothing you can do? Both apple and att need to get it together this is what your supposed to stop with the amount of money we pay. All I get when I can actually chat with a human or get support to actually talk to me its always the same line "not much we can do, did you try blocking the #'s? And then comes the upgrade your service protection to the "Centurion Package"  for a slight addition to you bill, Ive litteraly had to figure it all out on my own. For the person asking the question you can call customer support and ask them to block any text messages that come from email addresses and that will solve the spam text you get from email addresses for the phone numbers it's a little more complicated you can split your text messages into known and unknown and I suggest blocking group txts b/c I was getting those all the time too. With the known and unknown categories you can at least have an inbox with only people you want texts from.

the scammers are lightyears ahead of these phone and service companies if they allocated funds to improve defenses against these things I bet they could get ahead of these problems unfortunately I don't think they care or want to solve the issue. They would rather you pay for services that maybe block 10% of phishing/fraud texts. Its so dangerous to even report numbers b/c they want

I get very few spams calls and/or messages. When I see one I just delete immediately. Eventually they do go away if you are careful with what you do. The only persistent call I get is about my automobile warranty expiring. I also get the occasional call that is marked Spam by AT&T and just don't answer and delete once the phone stops ringing.

I agree that scammers/spammers/phishers are way ahead of the providers so it's not just AT&T that has issues, they all do. There really isn't much that can be done because most of them originate in a foreign country, which our laws don't apply to. Add to that constantly changing spoofed phone numbers/email addresses and you can see the magnitude of the problem.

What can I do if I am getting harassed via iphone text by a group of 20 (Edited per community guidelines) addicts? I am a 76 year old great-grandma who never wonder into that area but somehow, they got hold of my iphone number and I found myself in this group! When I told them to STOP , they started verbal harassments . I told them I was going to report them and they said they didn't care. I went to our local AT&T shop here in Texas. All they did was silenced the sound and told me to get another phone number. I have had this number with AT&T for almost 20 years! Because of my age, I need this number because of all the medical doctors and facilities I connect with. It would be too much for me to change numbers!

You can go to your settings on your phone and go to the messaging section scroll until you see group messages and you can either turn it on or off I had to

turn mine off

Or you can also go to the text window and press info and pick hide alerts and you least wont get bothered by it 

I noticed AT&T IMMEDIATELY  blocked my use of a word in my comment. Why can't you block  these "S.. Addicts " who are harassing me... that quickly or at all? 

@GM76  These forums have robots that block certain words.  And no, AT&T cannot block text messages.

My words of advice:  DO NOT RESPOND TO THE TEXT MESSAGES.  BY ENGAGING WITH THEM YOU ARE GIVING THEM A REASON TO CONTINUE.  IGNORE THEM AND THEY WILL MOVE ON.